Abstract: Combining the important position of the drilling technology and equipment in coal mine disaster control and the new demand of the intelligent construction of coal mine, the development history of the automatic drilling technology and equipment in coal mine in China was summarized. The main achievements and the technological breakthroughs in various development stages were described, including the underground remote electronic manual control, the ground remote electronic manual control, the ground remote automatic control, the fully automatic drilling combined with the single-manipulator pipe conveying system and the fully automatic drilling combined with the dual-manipulator pipe conveying system; the shortcomings of existing automatic drilling rigs were pointed out, such as conditions perception, data comprehensive analysis, drilling trajectory control, cluster cooperative construction and automation of supporting devices; some new problems and preliminary research ideas were proposed, such as intelligent sensing technology of drilling state and working condition, fusion and utilization technology of working condition and environmental parameters, automatic measurement and control technology of drilling track. It provided reference for the development of coal mine drilling technology and equipment from automation to intelligence.