Abstract: Combined with three stages of theoretical research on marine propellers in recent years, the development of research methods for marine propeller theories was reviewed and briefly analyzed. Momentum theory, blade ele ment theory, lifting lines theory, lifting surface theory and boundary element method were introduced respectively. The relationship between propeller theories and hydrodynamics was discussed primarily. The application on computational fluid dynamics of viscous fluid dynamics method was stressed and the direction of marine propeller theories was prospected. The results indicate that the theoretical research of marine propellers are closely related to hydrodynamics, and the progress on the test way of computational fluid dynamics and hydrodynamics will accelerate the development of propeller theories.