Camellia sect. Thea, a group of high economic value, is extremely complicated in taxonomy because of the diversity and the continuity of interspecies morphological characters. There exist lots of controversies of current classification systems about sectional taxonomic circumscription and species definition. Here the taxonomic history of Sect. Thea was systematically reviewed. Some taxonomists’ views on the causes of the taxonomic confusion and how to improve the taxonomy were also presented.