Secondary batteries have been widely developed and used in various fields, such as large-scale energy storage, portable electronic devices, and electric vehicles. Conductive additives, as an important component of lithium-ion batteries, could increase and maintain the electronic conductivity of the electrodes by constructing a conductive network, which will effectively improve the electrochemical performance of batteries. Although conductive additives account for a relatively small proportion of the cost of lithium batteries (around 2%), compared to the trillion level lithium battery industry, conductive additives have also become a trillion level industry. At present, the mainstream conductive additives are carbon black, conductive graphite, vapor grown carbon fiber (VGCF), carbon nanotubes, and graphene. They are ideal conductive additives for lithium-ion batteries because of superior properties such as low weight, high chemical inertness, and high specific surface area. Among them, carbon black, conductive graphite, and VGCF are traditional conductive additive materials that form point and line contact conductive networks between active materials; carbon nanotubes and graphene belong to new conductive additive materials, which respectively form wire and surface contact conductive networks between active materials. Compared to a single conductive agent, composite conductive agents create synergistic effects between different conductive agents, thus exhibiting better performance. Therefore, we believe that the new conductive agent has a highly unified relationship with traditional conductive agents. Taking into account both cost and performance, the future conductive agent system will gradually shift from singularity to multiple composites. In addition, China's conductive agents have long relied on imports. In recent years, some excellent enterprises have gradually broken through process barriers in preparation methods and dispersion technologies, accelerating the process of localization. This article will discuss the related work of using carbon nanomaterials as conductive additives in the field of batteries and improving their electrochemical performance. Then, further discuss the industrialization status and prospects of conductive additives.