Background muscle relaxants is an important part of compound general anesthesia, cisatracurium as a new type of non-depolarizing muscle relaxants, has a lot of advantages, and it is a ideal non-depolarizing muscle relaxants at present, but its onset time is slow during the induction of anesthesia, it is very susceptible to hypoxia, regurgitation and aspiration. Objective review the progress on methods of shortening the onset time of cisatracurium, to provide reference for the application of this drug. Content the methods of shortening the onset time of cisatracurium is large doses, priming principle and combination of drugs, this review will discusses the advantages and disadvantages of each method. Trend to shorten the onset time of cisatracurium can reduce the complication during the induction of anesthesia, and improve the safety of anesthesia.