Abstract: Software component technology provides a more effective design pattern than object-oriented methodology. Component-based software has been widely used in many fields and become a fairly popular software form in recent years. However, the features of component, such as information encapsulating and high evolvability, and properties of component composition (e.g., heterogeneous, loosely coupled and interoperability, etc.) bring great challenges to the testing of component-based software systems. In this paper, the representative testing methods and techniques for component and component-based software in recent years are analyzed and surveyed. Some effective testing frameworks and tools are also summarized and compared. Furthermore, the directions of future research are explored.