Compared to the eyes of the aircraft, airborne weather radar is an imperative avionics equipment for com mercial aviation, which is important and necessary to ensure the flight safety. At present, the key technology of airborne weather radar is mastered by foreign manufactures. This paper gives a comprehensive overview of airborne weather rada r and its related signal processing methods (including precipitation awareness, turbulenc e detection, wind shear detection and ground clutter suppression). The key techn ologies and the problems to be solved are also addressed. Finally, the next gene ration airborne weather radar with enhanced situation awareness and its opening problems are remarked.