This paper introduced the research status of nano zinc oxide used in the food antimicrobial composite packaging film. This paper summed up its development status, pointed out the research insufficiency and predicted the research trend in the future. Nano zinc oxide, as one of the important inorganic nano-sized metal antimicrobial agents, has been used in food antimicrobial composite packaging. Recent researches have found that the size, morphology, disperse uniformity, activation degree and concentration of nano zinc oxide have great influence on its antibacterial effect in different packaging systems. This paper summarized the recent researches on nano zinc oxide used in food packaging film, and pointed out that the study of ZnO migration in packaging film is incomplete, and more researches on the migration mechanism and the transport model are needed to predict the migration model. Researches on the combination use of two or more various functional agents are few and the application of composite agents will be the research focus in the future.