Abstract: The vigorous development of China's space exploration industry has posed numerous challenges to the reliability of aerospace equipment. In environments with drastic temperature changes, precise control of thermal deformation in materials and structures such as large-scale space structures, precision detection equipment, and microelectronic packaging has become a bottleneck issue that urgently needs to be broken through. Therefore, it is of great significance to develop mechanical metamaterials with tailorable thermal expansion coefficients. This article provides an overview of the current status and progress of research on the design, preparation, and characterization of tailorable thermal expansion mechanical metamaterials. It systematically sorts out the design methods of tailorable thermal expansion mechanical metamaterials, summarizes the collaborative control strategies of thermal expansion, stiffness, Poisson's ratio, and other mechanical parameters, explores the topological optimization methods of tailorable thermal expansion mechanical metamaterials, and introduces the preparation techniques and performance evaluation methods of thermally tailorable mechanical metamaterials. This article also looks into the development trends of tailorable thermal expansion mechanical metamaterials, providing guidance and reference for their in-depth application in aerospace equipment.