Legumes , including soybean, peanut and pulses crops, play important roles in agriculture system because of their ability in Nitrogen fixation, and they also provide a large amount of plant protein for human, especially for pool people from dry or semi dry regions. . Therefore, legumes are vital in ensuring global food security and human health. Seed coat is a basic trait for legumes, with rich variation of different colors, which not only an index for variety identification in intellectual property protection, but provide more selection for market. It is said that functional factors, such as polyphenols, always contain in seed coat. Thus, investigating the genetics and mechanism of seed color can accelerate the breeding process to meet diverse demands for market. However, up to now, these kinds of study are fairly few, especially in pulses crops, due to the lack of attention in the past decades. In the present study, we overviewed the classification of seed coat color in different legumes, the environmental factors such as light, temperature and water that affect the seed coat colors, the inheritance of different colors in different species, and we also reviewed the related studies on gene mapping and gene cloning. Finally, we discussed the genetic and breeding trends of seed coat color in legumes in future and hope to provide valuable information for those who engage in genetics, breeding, molecular biology, and related areas on legume crops.