Malnutrition is a subacute or chronic nutritional state, which can lead to changes in body composition and impaired functions, has an effect on treatment and clinical outcomes. Early and accurate identification of patients who are malnourished or at nutritional risk is essential to improve nutritional status and prognosis. However, there is a lack of clear and uniform definitions and diagnostic criteria for malnutrition, and the consensus on diagnostic criteria for malnutrition issued by the European Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition in 2015 has not been widely recognized. In 2018, the Global Leadership Initiative on Malnutrition (GLIM) consensus aims to unify the diagnostic criteria for malnutrition in adult hospitalized patients. Since the GLIM consensus has not yet proposed a unified method for muscle mass, which leads to different methods used to assess muscle mass between studies. The selection of effective assessment indicators and tools can accurately and timely assess the muscle mass, and provide a reference for nutritional status assessment. The paper reviews the assessment indicators and tools for muscle mass in the researches related to the GLIM criteria, aiming to get general overview of relevant researches on nutritional assessment using GLIM criteria in clinical practice, the indicators involved and related thresholds, provide reference for accurate and effective assessment of muscle mass in clinical practice and perfecting the application of GLIM criteria.