Abstract: The northern depression of the South Yellow Sea is a large Cretaceous-Cenozoic rift basin developed on the basis of a foreland basin by Indosinian orogeny. A number of research work, including both domestic and abroad, have been devoted to the tectonics of the South Yellow Sea and the stratigraphic sequences and deformation-infilling process of the depression. In this paper, we summarized the main achievements of previous studies, and compared the similarities and differences of the stratigraphic classification system between the Chinese and South Korean scholars. Weakness of the present study is cited and problems, which need to be solved urgently, were raised. The research work will help us better understand the dynamic mechanism of rift basins in the East Asia and collapsing mechanism of the Yangtze-North China orogenic belt. Strategically, it is of significance to break the deadlock in oil and gas exploration in the South Yellow Sea.