Abstract: With the rapid development of high power microwave technology, the importance of microwave limiters in the field of electromagnetic protection has become increasingly prominent. This paper systematically reviews the research progress on the response characteristics, spike leakage, and failure mechanisms of PIN limiters under the action of high power microwaves. Spike leakage originates from the mismatch between the carrier dynamics in the I layer and the transient characteristics of high power microwave signals. It poses a relatively low damage risk to low-noise amplifiers but may cause signal distortion. The failure of the device is essentially a process of energy dissipation imbalance under the effects of thermal accumulation and thermoelectric coupling. The damage threshold is closely related to pulse parameters, device structure, and material properties. The current research on the effects still faces technical challenges such as insufficient accuracy of multi-field coupling modeling, lack of in-situ monitoring means for the failure process, lack of unified standards for failure criteria, and an imperfect effect evaluation system. In the future, it is necessary to focus on the research of the high power microwave effects of highly integrated and new types of limiters, deepen the analysis of the failure process after material melting, and leverage artificial intelligence to optimize simulation and experimental design, so as to promote the development of research technologies on high power microwave effects.