Lithium-ion batteries are widely used in electric vehicles because of their high energy density and long cycle life. However, the spontaneous combustion accident of electric vehicles caused by thermal runaway of lithium-ion batteries seriously threatens passengers' personal and property safety. This paper expounds on the internal mechanism of lithium-ion battery thermal runaway through many previous studies and summarizes the proposed lithium-ion battery thermal runaway prediction and early warning methods. These methods can be classified into battery electrochemistry-based, battery big data analysis, and artificial intelligence methods. In this paper, various lithium-ion thermal runaway prediction and early warning methods are analyzed in detail, including the advantages and disadvantages of each method, and the challenges and future development directions of the intelligent lithium-ion battery thermal runaway prediction and early warning methods are discussed.