Bioethanol is one of the most promising and representative biofuel products. Photosynthetic production of ethanol using CO2 and solar energy based on cyanobacteria is of great significance for research and application, due to the potential to reduce CO2 emission and to provide renewable energy simultaneously. Here we review the history and updated development of cyanobacteria cell factories for ethanol photosynthetic production, the progress and problems in pathway optimization, chassis selection, and metabolic engineering strategies, and finally indicate the future development in this area.