In response to environmental concerns and the depletion of fossil resources, transitioning coatings toward sustainability is imperative. Bio-based coatings, derived from renewable biomass, represent a highly promising development pathway. This review comprehensively summarizes recent advances, prevailing challenges, and future prospects of bio-based coatings, with a focus on bio-based polymer resins—serving as the primary film-forming materials—and key auxiliary components such as pigments and fillers, additives, and solvents. This review systematically elaborates on the definition of bio-based coatings, their raw material sources, and international standards for bio-based carbon content determination. The core strategies for converting biomass into coating components are critically analyzed, namely direct utilization, physical blending, chemical modification, and biosynthesis. Furthermore, the synthesis, properties, and applications of key bio-based polymer systems—including epoxy, polyurethane, alkyd, and acrylic resins—are critically discussed, with particular emphasis on how molecular engineering enhances their performance and functionality. Despite significant progress, bio-based coatings still face several challenges, such as balancing performance and cost, ensuring the stability of raw material supply chains, and establishing globally unified standards. This review concludes that the integration of chemical modification and biosynthesis technologies, coupled with the establishment of a unified bio-based content standard system, constitutes two core drivers for advancing bio-based coatings from “green alternatives” toward “high-performance dominance” in the future.
Xia et al. (2025) studied this question.