The creation of a think tank to drive media transformation is an exploration worthy of attention. Through the analysis of literature in 142 published journal papers, this study fnds that the practice of think tanks in China's media has gone through two stages: “inner-oriented research institutions” and “outward-oriented media think tanks”. The theoretical understanding of the researchers has also changed and developed in these two stages, and there are some different perspectives due to the complexity of the subject and the mode of operation. The authors analyzed these issues in conjunction with relevant cases, survey and research.