Abstract: This paper first reviews the history and trends in the development of spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite technology in the USA and Europe. The basic information regarding launched satellites and future satellite plans are introduced. Then, this paper summarizes and categorizes the imaging algorithms of spaceborn SAR satellites, and analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of each algorithm. Next, the scope and the application status of each algorithm are presented. Then, the paper presents details of trends related to the SAR imaging algorithm, which mainly introduces the algorithms based on compressive sensing theory and new image modes. The simulation results are also presented. Finally, we summarize the development direction of the spaceborne SAR imaging algorithm.