With the improvement of living standards and the acceleration of work pace, the incidence of atrial fibrillation (AF) is increasing and has become a serious threat to public health. Atrial fibrillation is the loss of the normal regular diastolic activity of the heart muscle, replaced by rapid and uncoordinated weak peristalsis, resulting in the loss of the normal effective contraction of the atria. Atrial fibrillation can be divided into acute and chronic by time, and chronic atrial fibrillation can be divided into paroxysmal, persistent and permanent atrial fibrillation. If atrial fibrillation can be terminated by itself after the onset, it is called paroxysmal atrial fibrillation. If the attack cannot be terminated on its own, but can be terminated after treatment, it is called persistent AF, and generally AF lasting more than three weeks is considered persistent AF. If it cannot be terminated even after treatment, it is permanent atrial fibrillation. Secondary atrial fibrillation is mainly caused by diseases of the heart or other parts of the body, including rheumatic heart disease, coronary heart disease and hyperthyroidism, etc. At present, it is mainly improved by treating the underlying pathology or correcting atrial fibrillation during surgery. The causes of idiopathic atrial fibrillation are still the focus of academic research, and radiofrequency ablation surgery has become the main treatment for idiopathic atrial fibrillation in recent years. Currently, there are about 9 million patients with atrial fibrillation in China, and the proportion of paroxysmal and idiopathic atrial fibrillation is more than 1/3. These patients suffer from severe symptoms such as palpitations and chest tightness during atrial fibrillation episodes and the risk of stroke caused by intra-atrial thrombosis. The frequency of AF episodes increases over time and the duration of each episode becomes longer, resulting in reduced cardiac function, increased incidence of stroke, and a significant decrease in quality of life. As a result, the treatment of atrial fibrillation has become increasingly urgent and has become a global research priority in the field of cardiovascular disease. The maze procedure for atrial fibrillation has undergone a process from cumbersome to simplified, from exploration to maturity. Modern research suggests that atrial fibrillation may occur primarily at the intersection of the pulmonary veins and the left atrium, and that by isolating the electrical conduction from the pulmonary veins to the left atrium, the abnormal conduction loop can be interrupted to restore normal sinus rhythm. Catheter-based radiofrequency ablation for atrial fibrillation is essentially based on this principle, using a minimally invasive method of intervention to block electrical conduction from the pulmonary veins to the left atrium with the aim of curing atrial fibrillation. The advantage of this approach is that it is less invasive, but at the same time, it is constrained by some factors, especially the overall cure rate is not too high (about 50%) and the cost is about 70-100,000 RMB. The treatment concept of minimally invasive atrial fibrillation ablation surgery is also based on this principle, in which radiofrequency ablation is performed directly on the surface of the heart through small incisions in the bilateral chest wall in key areas related to the occurrence and maintenance of atrial fibrillation, in order to achieve the desired cure. This method is significantly less invasive than previous surgery, so it is now generally accepted by medical staff and patients. This procedure has been widely performed in our hospital, and the overall cure rate can reach 80-90%. The overall average time spent for minimally invasive surgery is about 3 hours, the patient has less postoperative pain and significantly faster recovery, the average postoperative hospitalization date is 5-6 days, and the average hospitalization cost is 30-40,000 RMB. In conclusion, although minimally invasive cardiac surgery for the treatment of atrial fibrillation is still in the developmental stage, the early results of the treatment performed in China and the current experience abroad show that its high single cure rate, low complication rate and low cost compared with catheter ablation make this new treatment method have an encouraging application prospect.