Abstract: Flow and sediment conditions play a vital role in the channel evolution of alluvial river，the selection of typical flow-sediment factors and their influence on riverbed erosion and siltation are the focus of river geomorphology and river engineering disciplines, and the research progress of river-phase relationship. Over the years, the scholars in different sectors carried out larger amount of research work and achieved rich achievements. This paper summarizes the research status of flow and sediment factor indicators from three aspects of discharge, sediment content and flow-sediment combination. The conclusion shows that: early scholars mostly discussed the changes of river channel erosion and siltation by a single influence factor of flow or sediment，and the follow-up research discovered that there is no stable correlation between single factor and river geomorphology and the riverbed erosion and siltation are affected by flow and sediment collocation. Recently, some proposed flow-sediment collocation indicators have played a significant role in the quantitative study of beach and channel erosion and siltation. At present, similar studies are mostly concentrated in large rivers, but the more mature research results are mostly based on the Yellow River Basin, so the application and revision in other watersheds need to be further developed.