Paternalistic leadership is a Chinese leadership theory that has received attention in recent years, and its influence spreads across various research fields. Among them, authoritarian leadership is the origin of Chinese leadership research, and it is also a very distinct and important part of the ternary leadership model. Compared with the study of organizational enterprises, there is still a lack of exploration of authoritarian leadership in the context of sports. In view of this, this paper attempts to review the research on authoritarian leadership. First, introduce the context of coaching leadership and describe the concept of authoritarian leadership. Second, examine the domestic empirical research on authoritarian leadership in the field of sports in order to present the impact of authoritarian leadership. Looking forward to learning from the past and knowing the future to provide future research directions.