With the increasing concern of governments and the public about global warming, greenhouse gas emissions have become one of the emerging research hotspots in recent years. However, as an important source of greenhouse gases, freshwater aquaculture ponds have not received enough attention. In this paper, the existing researches on greenhouse gas emission from freshwater ponds at home and abroad are reviewed systematically, the estimation methods and relevant results of carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions are emphatically introduced, the factors affecting greenhouse gas emission are mainly discussed, and the limitations and improvement direction of current research are discussed. The estimation methods include the carbon footprint concept for assessing CO2, the ORNL method, the IPCC emission factor method and the N2O emission factor method. The results show that the pond emission is huge and cannot be ignored. The influencing factors are mainly analyzed from four aspects, including water temperature, drainage activity, breeding species and breeding mode, which indicates the complexity of greenhouse gas emission mechanism. Finally, according to the current research status and trend of greenhouse gas emissions, the research on greenhouse gas emissions from freshwater aquaculture ponds is prospected from the specific analysis of emission structure and the standardization of estimation methods, so as to promote the development of relevant theories and practices.