As the population ages, China’s 260 million elderly people have a huge demand for different types and functions of elderly welfare facilities. An in-depth analysis of the status of elderly welfare facilities and their scientific direction are of great significance for the rational and effective allocation of elderly care resources and the improvement of quality and efficiency of elderly care services. On the basis of text data analysis and field investigation, the article divides the welfare facilities for the elderly into two types: residential-care institutions and daytime-welfare-facilities, discusses their development status and problems in recent 10 years, and points out the direction of future development. The research shows that the residential-care-institutions present the characteristics of accelerated institutional reform, differentiated development and the combination of medical care and nursing, and some problems such as positional deviation, disorderly development and low care quality. Daytime-welfare-facilities are characterized by a wide variety in cities, slow development in rural areas and preference for community facilities, and some problems such as insufficient effective supply and low management efficiency. The problems commonly existed in elderly welfare facilities are the lack of scientific planning and the failure to an on-demand allocation in urban and rural areas. Classified plan, balanced allocation and compound function are the directions of elderly welfare facilities in the future. Residential-care institutions should be classified as basic, welfare and market-oriented ones, and daytime-welfare-facilities as care-based and recreational-based ones. Urban and rural welfare facilities should be allocated in a balanced manner. welfare facilities should be reasonably arranged in community and suburb areas. We should develop compound welfare facilities with the functions of care, medical service, achieving, learning and recreation, and design the open, integrated and functional complementary welfare facilities for the elderly.
