Leaf color variation, is a widespread phenomenon in the plant kingdom, and is regulated by both environment and genetics. As a perennial leafy cash crop, leaf color is a phenotypic character that varies significantly among tea varieties, and is easy to observe and exploit. Tea varieties with leaf color variation are important germplasm resources with significant differences in the contents of key biochemical components such as chlorophylls, carotenoids, tea polyphenols, amino acids, caffeine and anthocyanins compared with that of normal green tea varieties, and these differential biochemical components have an important impact on the growth and development, stress resistance, tea quality and the suitability of tea processing. Current researches on leaf color variation in tea plants are mainly focused on the variation of quality components and the mechanism of leaf color variation. In this paper, we reviewed the current research progress on the types of leaf color variation of tea cultivars, some important biochemical components, variation mechanism of tea color, germplasm resource identification and exploitation, with a view to providing some references for the relevant research in the field of leaf color variation of tea plants.