The changing of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration is closely related with the changing of global ice sheet，temperature and sea level. Knowledge of the past atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration and its relationship with climate is an important method of predicting the future climate change. Coccolith derived long-chain alkenone carbon isotope is one of the important proxies to reconstruct past carbon dioxide, which is wildly applied in the reconstruction of the Cenozoic atmospheric carbon dioxide. In this paper, we focused on the method of alkenone-based atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, including the geochemical properties of long-chain alkenone, carbon diffusive model and the carbon isotope fraction. Then, we introduced the development of alkenone-based carbon dioxide proxy and its uncertainty. Coccolith cell geometry and growth rate have great influence on carbon dioxide fraction. Besides, there are some uncertainties about carbon concentration mechanisms in coccolithes, which may have some influence on alkenone-based carbon dioxide method to reconstruct ancient carbon dioxide more accurately. At the end, we summarized the Cenozoic carbon dioxide record with various proxies including alkenone carbon dioxide, boron isotope, palaeosol carbonate nodules and stomatal indices of fossil leaves.