Comparing with large aperture optical system,camera arrays optical system has characteristics of short development cycle and low cost,and has been widely used in space object observations in recent years.It has important application value in space security which can bring about optical observation with low cost,wide visual field,high resolution and high detection ability.In the paper,the latest applications and progresses of the camera array optical system at home and abroad are briefly reviewed.In view of the needs of space object observation,the structure and performance parameters of it are introduced from three aspects of field of view,resolution and detection capability.Also the existing problems and development trends of the system in space object observation are summarized.