Heavy metals, such as cadmium, are increasingly polluting soil, and they not only interfere with the life cycle of plants, but also reduce crop yields and even lead to plant death. Consequently, plants have evolved a series of defense mechanisms to resist heavy metal stress for themselves. Plant transcription factor MYB is a key regulator under stress, which can be co-regulated with downstream target genes in response to heavy metal stress, thus conferring tolerance to heavy metals and reducing their damage to plants. Understanding the molecular mechanisms by which plants cope with heavy metal stress (especially cadmium stress) is a primary goal of plant biotechnology research and agricultural breeding. In this paper, we mainly review five aspects, namely, identification and characteristics of MYB family members, functions and the mechanism of regulating target genes, how MYB regulates target genes to participate in heavy metal stress response through photosynthesis and hormones, etc. And we will deeply discuss that, in the adaptive mechanism of plants to heavy metal stress, MYB transcription factors combine with target genes or promoter elements through signaling pathways (reactive oxygen species homeostasis, abscisic acid signaling, gibberellins signaling, photosynthesis, etc.), which are involved in the regulation of uptake, transport and sequestration of heavy metals in plants. This paper provides a certain theoretical basis for further development and utilization of MYB transcription factors.