Photoacoustic spectroscopy gas detection technology is an important technology to realize trace gas detection by using photoacoustic effect. It has the advantages of high sensitivity, high selectivity, zero background signal and real-time online monitoring. It plays a vital role in the fields of environmental monitoring, mining and metallurgy, energy and electricity, medical and health care and so on. Considering the complexity of gas detection application environment, the actual detection environment is often the simultaneous existence of multiple component gases, and the content of each component gas needs to be monitored. At this time, the technology of simultaneous detection of multi-component gases is particularly important. This paper firstly introduces the basic principle and characteristics of photoacoustic spectroscopy gas detection technology and expounds on the application of photoacoustic spectroscopy technology with optical multiplexing method as the core in multi-component gas detection mainly from the perspective of the light source and photoacoustic cell, and analyzes the characteristics of quartz enhanced photoacoustic spectroscopy technology and its application in multi-component gas detection. Finally, the development trend of multi-component gas detection based on photoacoustic spectroscopy is summarized and prospected.