Optical hydrogen film materials based on palladium are the most important species of optical hydrogen film materials. They include Pd, Pd/Ni alloy, Pd/WO3, Pd/MoO3, Pd/TiOx and Pd/MoS2 films. This paper outlines the progress in research on optical hydrogen materials based on palladium from preparation, performance to application of these film materials. At present, the preparation of optical hydrogen film materials based on palladium is mainly using sputtering method. The performance of Pd film is the best in all optical hydrogen film materials based on palladium. However, there are some disadvantages such as foaming of Pd film surface, lamination fault sheet and decreasing of cohesion between Pd film and carrier in applications. Thereby, Pd/Ni alloy, Pd/WO3, Pd/MoO3, Pd/TiOx and Pd/MoS2 films are exploited one after another. But there are some problems in researches and applications of these film materials above-mentioned. The problems and direction in study on the materials based on palladium are put forward in discussions of the paper.