Abstract Purpose Wood decay fungi are the only forms of life capable of degrading wood to its initial constituents, greatly contributing to the soil ecosystem. This study summarizes the current research status and development characteristics of global wood decay fungi research, in order to better understand their role in soils. Methods A bibliometric analysis was applied to the literature from 1913 to 2020, based on data from the Web of Science (WOS) Core Collection. For this, various bibliometric analysis methods, R (Biblioshiny package), and VOSviewer were applied. Results A total of 8089 documents in this field were identified in the WOS Core Collection. The annual number of publications tended to increase, with exponential growth after 2008. Researchers in this field were mainly concentrated in North Europe, the USA, and China. Biotechnology, applied microbiology, environmental sciences, and microbiology were the most popular WOS categories. Bioresource Technology and Applied Environmental Microbiology were the top two journals with the most citations. The top three authors with the most published papers were Dai YC, Martinez AT, and Cui BK. Co-occurrence analysis of author keywords identified six clusters, mainly divided into three categories: the classification and diversity, the degradation mechanisms, and the ecological functions of wood decay fungi. Clustering results further showed that the lignin degradation process and the application of wood decay fungi in industrial production and soil contamination remediation are current research hotspots. Conclusions We present a comprehensive and systematic overview of research related to wood decay fungi and provide a deep perspective to understand the associated research progress. This is important for facilitating the development of a profound understanding of the contribution of wood decay fungi to soil systems and the degradation of soil contaminants.