Abstract: The essential problem of welding steel/aluminum dissimilar metals is how to suppress the formation of interfacial intermetallic compounds. In this paper,the types,morphology,thickness and factors affecting the growth of intermetallic compounds under solid/liquid interfacial reaction were summarized. In addition,a brief overview of the intermetallic compounds growth model was presented,and the problems in these models were analyzed. Most of the models do not consider the dissolution behavior. In some models the dissolution behavior was taken into account,but the approximate solutions do not fit well,and further research is needed.