: Lanterns are a significant symbol of traditional Chinese culture, encompassing the study of Chinese festival customs, intangible cultural heritage, and regional culture. This review mainly focuses on the literature included in the overseas edition of CNKI. The search was conducted with the keywords "lantern" and "design". After the researchers read and screened the titles, keywords and abstracts of the literature, a total of 114 articles were obtained. Through literary research, the characteristics of Chinese lanterns and the pathways of innovative design were organized and summarized, and a theoretical framework for digital lantern posters was proposed to encourage lantern researchers and scholars involved in related design to contemplate how to utilize digital design to present the lantern culture with rich connotations and achieve the protection, inheritance, and development of intangible cultural heritage projects.