With the strong demand of lightweight, structural and functional integration, high strength Al-alloy complicated precision parts are widely used in aerospace and other fields. But due to its poor welding and casting performance, it is difficult to be prepared by conventional techniques. Selective laser melting (SLM) is the most promising method to achieve the high demand requirements for producing such parts. High strength Al-alloy has many disadvantages such as low absorption rate of laser, high thermal conductivity, easy oxidation, containing abundant easy burning loss of alloy elements, which has a strong hot cracking tendency. It is hard to be formed, so its SLM forming technology lags far behind other materials. Despite all that, SLM-processing of high strength Al-alloy is developing rapidly in recent years because of its broad application prospect. This paper summarizes the research status, development trend and the main problems of high strength Al-alloy SLM at home and abroad.