Coral reef ecosystems play an important role in the global marine ecosystem by providing habitats for tropical marine animals, providing food and drug resources to mankind, and protecting coasts from the beating of waves. The coral reef ecosystem is one of the most productive ecosystems in the world. In order to understand the status quo and hotspots of coral-related research in our country and the whole world, this study used the method of bibliometrics to statistically analyze the studies that are related to coral reefs. Bibliometrics is a method of mathematical statistics that is used to analyze and excavate information from many papers. In this study, the WEB OF SCIENCE database and the Chinese national infrastructure (CNKI) were the international and domestic data sources respectively. For the bibliometrics, this study used Excel to calculate the number of publications according to the year, Bibexcel to create a high-frequency co-word matrix, and Ucinet and Netdraw to draw a co-word network visualization map. Then, SPSS was used to analyze coral research trends and hotspots by dividing related international and domestic studies into four clusters each. This research showed: ① According to the number of papers, the progress of international research had two periods, and the progress of domestic research can be separated into four parts: tentative exploration, embryonic development, fluctuating growth, and steady increase. The number of international and domestic studies on corals both had a roughly increasing tendency, although some years showed a decline. International and domestic studies came into maturity in the 1990s, but domestic studies were slightly later than international. ② The highest-frequency words in international studies were coral, coral reefs, coral bleaching, and climate change, while in domestic studies they were coral reef, Scleractinian corals, Scleractinia, and Weizhou Island. International coral studies were more inclined to explore the causes of coral reef degradation, while domestic research was focused on improving the reef-building ability of coral reefs. ③ According to the co-word analysis, the high-frequency key words from international studies coral reefs, corals, climate change, and sedimentation can be viewed as study hotspots to some extent. ④ According to cluster analysis, there was similarity between international and domestic studies. They both mainly focused on the aspects of the coral reef ecosystem and environmental and climatic factors that are affecting corals, but both international and domestic studies have their own inclinations. In a summary, because the current state of coral reef degeneration is serious, international and domestic studies have both focused on coral reefs. In recent years and in the future, studies about corals and coral reefs may pay more attention to the topic of restoring coral reefs or helping coral reef ecosystems recover on their own.