With the rapid development of information perception technology and robotics technology, automatic orientation has more requirements and implementation methods. Automatic orientation technology provides favorable conditions for the automation and intelligence of intelligent agricultural production process. Automatic orientation is one of the important links to improve operation efficiency and quality. Automatic orientation technology has become the development direction of agricultural production automation and intelligent operation technology. Firstly, the basic concept and connotation of automatic orientation technology was expounded, the research progress of automatic orientation technology at home and abroad in agricultural fields such as field sowing, post mining treatment, livestock breeding and processing was summarized, and the characteristics, advantages and disadvantages of different application fields were analyzed and compared. Then the application research of the key technology of automatic orientation was systematically analyzed, including the common key problems of the orientation mechanism and method, the orientation mechanism and device, the automatic detection and control, and the openness of the technology in this field was summarized. Finally, the challenges and opportunities of automatic orientation technology were summarized. And the future research direction of automatic orientation technology and device were prospected, such as automatic orientation technology and equipment for agricultural machinery and agronomy integration, special and general automatic orientation technology and equipment, automatic orientation technology and equipment with multi-function and comprehensive integration, automatic orientation technology and equipment combined with intelligent technology.