Degradation of cement-based materials with the infrastructure engineering constructed in 20 th century for the end of service-life is increasingly concerned. Acoustic emission (AE) as an intrinsic physical phenomenon of energy emission happening inside material or structure can effectively support a precise sensation of health of material and structure based on its spatiotemporal information. This review briefly introduced the sensing principle and analysis method of AE and summarized the supports from AE to description of degradation process, influence factors, and cement-based material degradation such as alkali aggregate reaction, corrosion induced cracking, fatigue damage, and freeze-thaw spalling. In addition, the potential aspects to enrich AE research on the degradation of cement-based materials were also discussed via considering the time-dependent and large-scale feature of hydraulic structure.