Introduction  Floating offshore wind turbines technology is developing rapidly in Europe, America and Japan, and other developed countries, because of its advantages, such as non-restriction of water depth, easy installation, maintenance, transport, etc.This paper reviews the key technologies and engineering cases of floating offshore wind turbines, in order to provide references for research works and projects in this field.

  Method  This paper introduced the background of floating wind turbines technology,and then provided detailed introduction on its key technologies, for instance, stability checking, mooring sysytem, dynamic cable,hydrodynamics, aerodynamics, integral calculation, model basin tests, manufacture, installation, engineering challenges and cases.Finally, the paper summarized potential market and applications of floating wind turbines technologies.

  Result  The paper summarizes the state of art of the key technologies and future development of floating wind turbines.

  Conclusion  This review presents the key technologies and engineering cases of floating wind turbines. There are quite a few technology challenges and problems which worried industry. Hence, the solution to reduce project cost and to facilitated the growth of the industry is multipath, for instance, the more active policy support, making technological breakthrough, and cultivation of the industrial chain.