Plant lesion mimic mutation is a phenomenon that plant leaves, sheaths or the whole plant spontaneously generate necrotic lesions of the pathogen infection without significant abiotic stress, physical and mechanical damage or external pathogenic factors. The phenomenon of local cell death is similar to the symptoms of hypersensitive response (HR), which is a kind of programmed cell death (PCD). Many lesion mutants constitutively express pathogenesis-related genes and enhance the resistance to some pathogens. Therefore, lesion mimic mutants can be used as ideal materials for studying plant defense response and PCD. This review summarized the origin, name, type, inheritance, resistance characteristic, gene clone, development mechanism and signal transduction pathway. Future research avenue of plant lesion mutants was prospected, which may provide theoretical basis for further exploration of the regulatory mechanism of plant PCD and defense response.