Objective To understand the status and trends of psychiatric nursing research in mainland, China, so as to provide a reference for future relevant research. Methods CNKI was taken as data source, Chinese psychiatric nursing articles published from 2009 to 2021 were retrieved, then bibliometric analysis and visual analysis were conducted based on the authors, research institutes and keywords by using the Endnote and CiteSpace software. Results A total of 11 061 articles were retrieved and included, which appeared a trend of fluctuation change.From 2011 to 2013 and from 2016 to 2018, the number of publications on psychiatric nursing was over 900 each year, cooperation between different institutions was not close, and the core group of writers has not been fully established.A total of 124 high frequency keywords were obtained, composed 10 categories, of which the nursing and intervention for depressed patients was a hot field, other hot issues included emotional mental diseases, mental health nursing, quality of life, etc. Conclusion Psychiatric nursing research develops continuously, cooperation among institutions and authors need to be strengthened.In the future, emotional mental diseases, geriatric mental health nursing and psychiatric rehabilitation will be research hotspot.