ObjectiveTo investigate the current status and hotspots in researches of gastrointestinal stromal tumor.MethodsThe literatures related to gastrointestinal stromal tumor and published from 2000 to 2019 were extracted from Web of Science Core Collection. Visualization analysis was conducted by utilizing CiteSpace and VOSviewer software based on bibliometrics methods.ResultsA total of 3 226 articles and reviews were retrieved. The number of publications increased from 2000 to 2019, from the initial 34 publications gradually increased to 241 in 2019, and the maximum number of publications was 265 in 2015. The most productive five countries in terms of publication number were: 907 in the United States, 540 in China, 522 in Japan, 219 in Germany, and 214 in Italy. Co-occurrence networks of keywords were divided into three clusters: targeted therapy, clinical management, and pathogenesis research. Co-citation analysis of literatures contained 9 clusters, and cluster #0 prognosis was the latest cluster, indicating the research frontier and tendency.ConclusionsThe United States and its domestic institutes are the pioneers. Targeted therapy, clinical management, and pathogenesis researches are the main research filed. Prognosis research may be the new research tendency, and clinical and basic researches are still hotspots in medical research.