Nyquist Shannon sa mpling theorem was presented about 70 years ago, which contributed a lot to the transform from analog mode to digital one. In the process of 70 years′ development, focusing on how to reduce the sampling rate and amount of data without informa tion loss, many novel sampling theories are pr oposed and developed, including random sampling, compressive sensi ng based sampling, finite rate of innovation sampling and Xampling. Based on the overview of the present sparse sampling theories and frameworks, the features and application fields are summarized, the lat est developments are introduced, several open problems are reviewed and the existing difficul ties of these new sampling methods with personal opinions are discussed. Finally, t he prospect of sparse sampling technology is drafted to provide a refer for improving the sampling technology and expanding the application fields.