The work aims to analyze the current situation and progress of handicraft design research in China, and provide a certain reference for the future promotion of research in this field. The knowledge structure map of related documents in the field of handicraft design research in CNKI core Chinese periodical database from 1995 to 2023 was analyzed by CiteSpace visual document analysis tool. The results show that the research process of handicraft design in China can be divided into five stages:embryonic stage, preliminary development, fluctuating & rising, vigorous development, and keeping great popularity; Research institutions are mainly concentrated in first-tier cities and new first-tier cities. The research teams of colleges and universities are distributed in a state of small agglomeration and large dispersion. Academic cooperation is not close enough and interdisciplinary needs to be strengthened, which are the limitations of current research. The research focuses on collaborative design, traditional handicrafts, inheritance and development, and product design. Focusing on brand building and intellectual property protection, deep integration with fashion industry, strengthening Chinese cultural IP, promoting design in interdisciplinary fields with the help of digital and intelligent tools, promoting product sales and skill protection & inheritance based on Internet technology, being more convenient in cultivation of handicraft talents and social transmission, deepening productive protection of rural handicrafts, developing cultural and tourism products tailored to local conditions, refined & extensive & diversified research on rural handicraft design under policy guidance are the research trends in this field.