At present, the application of the robot assisted surgery system in the surgical treatment of esophageal cancer is gradually emerging, and it is more and more widely used and recognized in the field of surgery. According to the domestic and foreign literatures, the robot has many advantages, and robotic assisted esophageal cancer surgery has been proved to be safe and effective, and its short-term efficacy is significantly better than thoracotomy. Other studies have shown that in long-term follow-up, the effect is comparable to video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery. In this paper, the author are systematically reviewed the development history of the robot assisted surgery system, the effect of robotic assisted esophagectomy on safety, surgical method, short-term efficacy and long-term prognosis. The traditional open surgery and thoracoscopic laparoscopic esophagectomy has been carried on the detailed comparison to provide some advice and theoretical basis for esophageal cancer surgery robot system.