Abstract: Renal cell carcinoma(RCC) is the most important pathological type of renal carcinoma. Among all the RCC, clear cell renal cell carcinoma(ccRCC) is the most common type, followed by papillary renal cell carcinoma(PRCC) and chromophobe renal cell carcinoma(ChRCC). With the widespread use of the next generation sequencing(NGS), more and more studies concerning commonly mutated genes such as VHL, PBRM1, etc. and copy number variation(CNV) including loss of chromosome 3p have now emerged in ccRCC. Researches involving mutations and CNV are also common in PRCC and ChRCC. This paper mainly reviews the molecular genetic alterations of several common RCC including gene mutation, CNV, gene fusion, etc.