In order to analyze the yearly volume of journal publishing, study the research development process, identify hotspots and evolution, and discover development frontier and trend of the forest park tourism research, 1581 papers from core journals of CNKI have been studied and summarized using the method of Mapping Knowledge Domains and CiteSpace tool. The result suggests that the development of research on forest park tourism can be divided into three stages: initial stage (1981—1990), development stage (1991—2005), and mature stage (2006—now). Evidently, the research papers of key journals in this field account for a small proportion of the total, and comprehensive research strength of forest park tourism is relatively weak, which indicated this given topic is relatively unexplored. There is no significant author center and little cooperation in the peer review process. There are many smaller research teams and a large number of independent researchers. Research institutions including colleges and universities, vocational colleges, research institutes, administrative agencies, and planning and design agencies, cover various fields. The cooperation between research institutions is good, but the cooperation intensity is average, and the cooperation across different research levels and regions is lacking. The research hotspots and its evolution of forest park tourism have consecutively gone through five stages: research on industrial development and its effects; research on evaluation, planning and development, and protection of forest park tourism resources; research on ecotourism, environmental carrying capacity and sustainable development; research on marketing, management system and development mode; research on new formats, connotation and high-quality development. The present and future research on forest park tourism will focus on three cores. They are tourists, scenic spots and industrial development, and the research will place emphases on ecological compensation, tourist perception, environmental impact, brand building, high-quality development, development innovation, and the excavation of economic, ecological, cultural and service value and connotation based on forest park. According to the research, “ecotourism dominates the forest and grass tourism of China” is the inevitable choice of China’s social and economic development, which contains a profound community value orientation. The prospect of forest park ecotourism research is optimistic. The research of forest park tourism should further strengthen the cooperation and exchange, excavate the theoretical depth, and improve the content system of the research. The study aims to clarify and interpret the development context and evolution process of forest park tourism research, and to promote the unified development of related concepts and theories, and better guide the practice and further promote the healthy and efficient development of forest park tourism.