Abstract Natural earthquake is the most common source of seismology research. The research of underground medium wave velocity change using repeated earthquake data has some important results, but it is limited by time and space distribution and quantity, which is suitable for structural detection and measurement of wave velocity change to global scales. Background noise as another natural source, it has small time and space limitations, and its resolution and accuracy are higher than those of repeated earthquake. Artificial seismic source is not influenced by region and station density, its detection accuracy can reach to 10-4 level. Compared with repeated earthquake and background noise, artifical source can identify the seismic wave velocity change caused by tectonic stress. In recent years, the use of methods such as natural repeated earthquake, background noise, and artificial source to measure wave velocity change in underground medium has become a hot research topic in seismology. Through the accurately measuring of underground medium change, we can study the physical process and promote earthquake prediction. This paper introduces the principle, method and progress in the field of seismology of natural repeated earthquake, background noise and artificial seismic source. Finally, the advantages and limitations of several kinds of methods in practical application are presented.