Solid state lighting sources based on GaN-based high power light emitting diodes (LEDs) have been considered as one of the most valuable light sources in 21th century due to its many unparalleled advantages over other conventional lighting sources. It is a sensible strategy choice to promote the developments of solid state lighting industrial progress by making a breakthrough at some high class solid state lighting products, which can utilize the advantages of high power LEDs through introducing revolutionary design ideas based on non-imaging optics. In this paper, the history and development of non-imaging optics and its application in solid state lighting are reviewed. Then, the non-imaging optical system design principles and practical solutions are given through a few samples including optical system design of bundles-coupling, two-dimentional (2D) prescribed light distribution and 3-dimentional prescribed light distribution problems based on LEDs.