Objective To assess the worldwide research status and the development trend of colorectal cancer.

Methods Based on the papers of colorectal cancer indexed in SCI-E database from 2000 to 2019, the year of publication, countries, institutes, sources of journals, discipline fields, highly cited papers in ESI and research hotspots were analyzed by the bibliometric method.

Results A total of 160183 papers on colorectal cancer were retrieved, and the number of papers increased year by year. The top 10 countries were USA, China, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, South Korea, France, Netherlands and Canada. Harvard University in the USA had a significant advantage on the research of colorectal cancer. The rank of the journals, institutes and highly cited papers were absolutely dominated by USA. Global research activities on the colorectal cancer displayed the characteristics of interdisciplinary development. The research hotspots mainly focus on the gut microbiota, genetic testing, targeted therapy, immunotherapy and so on.

Conclusion It is necessary to strengthen the close combination of basic research and clinical application, and carry out colorectal cancer research in interdisciplinary collaboration with clinical problems.