China possesses a profound tradition of home economics education, wherein domestic science served as its core component, encompassing extensive content and rich cultural significance that exerted enduring influence on subsequent generations. In the modern era, home economics education originated within domestic science courses offered by missionary women’s schools. The establishment and institutionalization of women’s academies during the late Qing and early Republican periods laid essential groundwork for its development. Subsequently, the surge in Chinese students studying in Japan catalyzed heightened scholarly engagement with Japanese home economics, leading to the translation of numerous Japanese academic works on the subject. Following the Boxer Rebellion (1900), the rise of American-oriented education redirected the trajectory of home economics pedagogy from Japan toward the United States. Female students who pursued home economics studies in America became pivotal figures in advancing this field during the Republican era (1912-1949). Through prolonged and complex evolution, home economics education in China underwent state-directed standardization, culminating in the formation of a comprehensive institutional framework by the 1930s-940s.