The civil aviation community is actively exploring and developing the solutions of single pilot operations (SPO) for large commercial aircraft. Human factors engineering research for SPO has been launched, and the research mainly focuses on three research solutions： flight deck airborne equipment upgrade, flight support from ground stations, and the combined SPO solution of “flight deck airborne equipment upgrade + flight support from ground stations". This paper reviews and analyzes the progress of human factors engineering research on SPO. The preliminary research outcome tends to support the combined SPO solution. However, the current human factors engineering research is not comprehensive and cannot provide a complete human factors engineering solution for SPO. For future human factors engineering research, this paper analyzes the key human factors issues on SPO and points out the gaps in the current research and the key areas for future work. Finally, this paper puts forward an overall strategy and recommendations for future human factors engineering research on SPO.