Abstract: There are numerous types of tunnel defects during the operation period, and various remediation methods are available. Ignoring the documentation and analysis of tunnel defect information will severely affect the efficiency of defect remediation and hinder the safe operation of tunnels. Therefore, establishing a tunnel defect management system for the efficient management of defect information is of great significance for tunnel operation and maintenance. This paper analyzes in detail the current research status of tunnel defect management systems in China from the perspectives of defect information databases and software platforms, and provides an outlook on their future development trends. The study finds that, at present, defect information databases are mainly developed based on relational databases. However, these databases have limited data capacity, and data storage is confined to text information and monitoring data. On the basis of these databases, interactive software developed using the C/S architecture(Client/Server) has poor scalability, and the information expression capability is weak. Additionally, the B/S architecture (Browser/Server) based browser platforms are limited by network environments, have poor timeliness, and cannot handle large-scale data throughput. Therefore, introducing non-relational databases, increasing the storage capacity for defect information, and incorporating defect detection images into management systems is an important direction for the future development of defect databases. Furthermore, developing an interactive management platform based on a hybrid C/S-B/S architecture, balancing in-depth analysis of defect detection data and diverse expression of defect information, is a feasible direction for the future development of software platforms.