As an important material in the process of unconventional oil and gas production, proppant plays a vital role in improving the recovery rate of unconventional oil and gas. With the development of proppant technology, multifunctional proppants have been designed and prepared to meet various needs. Understanding the mechanism of proppant action and migration patterns during unconventional oil and gas production can also provide more targeted guidance for proppant development. This paper introduces the classification, functions and existing technologies of proppants. After dividing proppants into common proppants and new proppants, experimental and simulation studies on proppant migration and placement rules are reviewed. At present, proppants at home and abroad are mainly developing in the direction of low density, high strength, high conductivity and multi-functionality, and combined with the experimental data of proppant migration and placement to improve the simulation study of Euler-Euler, Euler-Lagrangian and Lagrangian-Lagrangian model is also an important development direction for the exploration of proppant migration rules in the future.