The global urbanization has produced a number of metropolises with complex urban spatial structures. Compared with monocentric cities, these metropolises typically have multiple urban centers/subcenters (UCSs). The formation and development of UCSs is driven by physical, economic and human-activity-related factors. The planning of UCSs can significantly affect the future development of a city. Considerable research has been conducted to investigate the different morphologies and functions of UCSs. Mixed findings have been reported for the identification of UCSs, which is mainly due to the ambiguity of their conceptualizations, variety of data types, different spatial scales, and diverse identification methods. Therefore, existing approaches must be evaluated to clarify their use in different social, economic and environmental contexts. In this study, we conducted a systematic literature review of 70 journal papers published from 1990 to 2020 with respect to the concepts, data, analytical units, and methods used to identify UCSs. By comparing their strengths and weaknesses, the critical issues of these methodological frameworks are identified. The findings suggest that the preferred path for identifying UCSs is one that is objective, context-appropriate, theoretically supported, and based on data.

全球城市化进程催生了一批具有复杂城市空间结构的大都市。与单中心城市相比，这些大都市通常有多个城市中心/副中心（UCS）。UCS 的形成和发展受物理、经济和人类活动相关因素的驱动。UCS 的规划可以显着影响城市的未来发展。已经进行了大量研究来研究 UCS 的不同形态和功能。UCSs 的识别结果不一，主要是由于其概念模糊、数据类型多样、空间尺度不同、识别方法多样。因此，必须对现有方法进行评估，以阐明它们在不同社会、经济和环境背景下的用途。在这项研究中，我们对 1990 年至 2020 年发表的 70 篇期刊论文进行了系统的文献综述，内容涉及用于识别 UCS 的概念、数据、分析单位和方法。通过比较它们的优势和劣势，确定了这些方法框架的关键问题。研究结果表明，识别 UCS 的首选路径是客观、适合上下文、有理论支持并基于数据的路径。