Bismuth-based composite oxides are always considered the best visible-light photo catalysts for oxygen production. However, they are failed to photocatalytic reduce the hydrogen from water, due to their lower conduction band made up by Bi 6p and O 2p. Thus, it is significant to modulate their levels of the conduction and valence bands satisfying the redox potential for both H+/H-2 and O-2/H2O, which will directly lead to discovering new visible-light materials for photocatalytic hydrogen generation. Recent years, some modified bismuth-based composite oxides have been reported to achieve photocatalytic hydrogen production. In this paper, a review of photocatalytic hydrogen generation by bismuth-based composite oxides is presented, mainly including energy band engineering, Z-scheme overall water splitting, and strategies for photocatalytic activity improvement. (C) 2018 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.