National defense education is a strong contributor in maintaining national security, enhancingnational cohesion, improving the population quality and promoting social progress. Through collecting 855 documentsfrom CSSCI and Chinese core journals on China Knowledge Network (CNKI) as research samples to analyze thedomestic colleges and universities defense education research from 2003 to 2023, it was found that among the highfrequencykeywords (frequency ≥ 6 times), the 12 keywords such as “civil-military integration” and “national defensetechnology” might be the hot-button issues for national defense education research. And there was a strong correlationbetween “military culture” and “building”, “college students” and “national spirit”, and “colleges and universities” and“national defense”. Therefore, the research presented 4 distinct stages: researches mainly included 3 aspects, namely,national defense education in colleges and universities, cultural national defense education and national defenseeducation support; the future research on national defense education would focus on 3 parts, that is, national security,civil-military integration and synergistic approach to nurturing talents.