Abstract: The refined seafloor topography models play an important role in fields of submarine plate tectonic movement, underwater carrier navigation support and marine resource exploration and so on. This paper reviews the development of seafloor topography detection technology and model construction, and discusses the current research status and main challenges of the global refined seafloor topography modeling. Also, the developing trends of global seafloor topography modeling are summarized, considering that the technology of recovering seafloor topography from altimeter-derived marine gravity anomalies is still the main way to construct global seafloor topography models. New altimeter satellites such as dual satellite tandem altimeter and surface water ocean topography will provide data sources for further improving the accuracy of marine gravity field and seafloor topography models. Optimization of seafloor topographic inversion theory based on topographic complexity is expected to bring theoretical innovation. It is worth paying attention to explore the application of artificial intelligence technology in global seafloor topography modeling.