Aging is a normal physiological phenomenon, which is closely related to age-related diseases. In recent years, the mechanisms of aging and the development of anti-aging drugs have become the hotspot in scientific research. However, Establishing a suitable aging animal is complex and costly, so it is of great significance to make a suitable animal model. D-galactose-induced sub-acute aging animal model has been widely used by domestic and foreign scholars because of its advantages of low cost, simple and convenient operations, and stable and reliable results. In this review, we summarized the D-galactose-induced aging animal model and its possible mechanisms.