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BACKGROUND: Traditional rehabilitation training has limited potential to improve functional recovery from chronic injuries. Increasing attentions have been paid to the application of rehabilitation robots in rehabilitation training of chronic injuries. OBJECTIVE: To analyze and track the hot spots and frontiers of related research in the field of rehabilitation robot in the past 10 years, thereby providing some guidance for future research. METHODS: The literatures regarding rehabilitation robots published from 2010 to 2020 were retrieved in the Web of Science core database by computer. Search strategy was TS=(rehabilitation robot OR rehabilitation robotics). CiteSpace 5.7 visualization software was used to analyze the hot spots and frontiers of rehabilitation robot research from the aspects of high-influence countries/regions, institutions, authors, high-frequency keywords and burst words. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: A total of 3 194 literatures were included. In recent years, the research on rehabilitation robots has been growing steadily. The number of relevant literatures published annually shows a steady increase trend. The number of articles published by the United States ranks first, followed by China. Northwestern University in the United States ranks first with 161 articles published. Professor Riener R, from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, has published 48 articles, ranking the first among the authors. Nine representative keyword clusters have formed, and the research emphasis and direction change over time. In recent 10 years, the relevant research focuses on intelligent control of rehabilitation robots, task analysis and learning, performance and reliability, and how to realize the natural and accurate interaction between robot and human through the integration of machine intelligence and biological intelligence. At present, rehabilitation robots are the most widely used in the field of upper limb and nerve injuries, and the interest in brain-machine interface, virtual reality, flexible wearable, task analysis and the exoskeletons has increased in the research of rehabilitation robot, which are the frontiers and hot issues in recent years, representing the development trend of future studies, and referring to the future research direction. Future research in the field of rehabilitation robots should focus on the following aspects: First, focus on the functional needs of patients to improve the quality of life. Secondly, strengthen multidisciplinary cooperation and build a cooperation network among regional countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]