In recent years

the important application prospect of soft actuator materials in wearable devices

medical and health devices

and soft robots

etc

. has received much academic and industrial attention. The electroactive polymer (EAP) which is a soft actuator material can change its shape or size by applying an electric field. The EAP materials can be divided into electronic and ionic EAP based on electromechanical mechanism. In contrast with electric EAPs

the ionic electroactive polymer (IEAP) based-actuators have significant advantages for applications in medical machines and wearable devices due to their low driving voltage. In recent years

the shortcomings of traditional IEAP-based actuators such as slow actuation rate

low durability in the atmosphere and low actuation strain and stress are significantly improved by developed electrode materials and ionic liquid based polymer gel electrolyte materials. In this review

we comprehensively summarized the progress of IEAP-based actuators including ionic polymer metal composite (IPMC) actuators

conductive polymer actuators

Bucky gel actuators and ionic gel actuators

etc

. In addition

we also reviewed the electromechanical coupling mechanisms and the application progresses of IEAP-based actuators

and discussed the challenges and future development trends of IEAP-based actuators.