The aerosol radiative forcing effect mainly influences the balance of the Earth’s radiation through two pathways, namely aerosol-radiation interaction (ARI) and aerosol-cloud interaction (ACI). However, uncertainty in ACI is one of the most important uncertainties in the Earth’s radiation factor in the IPCC AR5 report. In the field of aerosol-cloud global detection, the detection capability and development direction of space-borne lidar for cloud-aerosol remote sensing plays an very important role to study the global aerosol-cloud distribution characteristics. Therefore, the application status of space-borne lidar for cloud-aerosol remote sensing was analyzed firstly, and the technical characteristics about the detection task, opto-mechanical system parameters, structure and materials of typical space-borne lidar for aerosol-cloud (LITE、CALIPSO、CATS and ATLID) were focused on. Secondly, the characteristics of each space-borne lidar for aerosol-cloud were compared and analyzed from the aspects of working mechanism, opto-mechanical system structure, applied materials and detection capabilities. The design features and methods of opto-mechanical system of space-borne lidar for aerosol-cloud were proposed. Finally, the technical characteristics and development direction of the current space-borne lidar for aerosol-cloud were analyzed. The technical direction and development suggestions for the development of space-borne lidar for cloud-aerosol were proposed in China.