Soil organic carbon is the largest carbon pool of the terrestrial ecosystem. Global warming could affect the size of carbon fluxes and result in a net release of carbon from soil to the atmospheric as CO₂. The response and adaptation of soil organic carbon to climate change play an important role in predicting future effects of climate change. However, there are many unsolved issues regarding the effect of warming on soil organic carbon mineralization and its mechanism. This study reviewed the effects of warming on soil organic carbon mineralization. The results showed that warming could promote soil organic carbon emission, which primarily resulted from changes in soil microbial metabolic activity or microbial community composition. Moreover, there was a large difference in emission intensity with different ecosystem types, warming modes, warming seasons, and the durations of warming. Furthermore, soil microorganisms would acclimate and adapt to long-term warming, thus reduced or alleviated the positive feedback effect of the terrestrial ecosystem on global warming. However, these results were based mainly on temperate regions, and the effect of warming experiments in situ for areas with high productivity and rich biodiversity, such as the tropical and subtropical regions, need further research. The method of soil incubation could reveal the influence and mechanism of temperature on soil organic carbon mineralization but cannot simulate real field results. Similarly, different types of field warming, as well as variety in the types of incubation, could reduce the comparability among different methods. Moreover, it is difficult to estimate the discrepancy among the results derived from the differences in the methods. Therefore, this review put forward the prospect of an additional study, to provide a theoretical basis for further research concerning the effects of warming on soil organic carbon.