Advances in the diagnostic techniques of African swine fever

African swine fever (ASF) is a highly contagious disease of pigs caused by African swine fever virus, which poses a huge threat to the global swine industry and is therefore listed as a notifiable disease by the World Organization for Animal Health. Due to the global lack of safe and efficacious vaccines and therapeutic drugs, early diagnosis of cases, whether on-site or laboratory, are crucial for the prevention and control of ASF. Therefore, rapid and reliable diagnosis and detection have become the main means to combat ASF. In this paper, various diagnostic techniques developed globally for ASF diagnosis, including etiological, molecular biological and serological diagnostic techniques, as well as conventional and novel diagnostic techniques, were comprehensively reviewed, and the main advantages and disadvantages of currently commonly used diagnostic techniques were introduced. It is expected that this paper will provide references for selecting appropriate ASF diagnostic techniques in different application scenarios, and also provide directions for the development of innovative diagnostic techniques for ASF in the future.