Osteoarticular infections (OAIs) is still a serious disease in clinic.The accurate and early detection of the pathogens that cause osteoarticular infections remains important for administering clinical treatment.Traditional detection methods is slow and has a low positive rate.Therefore,there remain no good methods or techniques for determining the pathogens responsible for OAIs.In recent years,an increasing number of studies have reported metagenomic next-generation sequencing（(mNGS）) is fast and has a high specificity and sensitivity and could be used as an effective diagnostic tool.This article summarizes the application of major traditional techniques in the diagnosis of OAIs and discuss the prospects of mNGS in the diagnosis of OAIs.