The nanolaser based on surface plasmon polariton (SPP) can reduce the light source size by several orders of magnitude, which combines with surface plasmon waves to confine its transmission within nanoscale, breaks through the diffraction limit to match the size of the electronic devices and finally realizes the miniaturization and low power consumption of an entire optical interconnection system. This paper briefly describes the basic principle of SPP, summarizes the recent research progress on SPP nanolasers, and introduces in detail their various structures and advantages. Moreover, the challenges and future work of nanolasers in the development process are elaborated upon, and the broad applications of nanolasers are prospected.