Currently, composites have been widely used in the field of aviation. The inner defects of composites are usually detected by infrared thermal wave detection technologies. By processing the infrared thermal wave image sequences acquired, the defect information of composites can be obtained accurately and quantitatively. According to the demands of infrared thermal wave testing technologies, several processing technologies for thermal wave image sequences of composites at home and abroad are analyzed and compared with each other. The research and applications of these image processing technologies are reviewed. The future development trend in this field is forecasted. Thus, a certain basis is provided for the selection of infrared thermal wave image sequence processing technologies.