Most crude oils produced in China are waxy crude with poor flowability at ambient temperature. Pipelining waxy crudes by means of heating is a common practice. Some complex transient heat transfer problems are accompanied with hot oil pipelines. The state-of-the-art and recent advances in transient heat transfer research for buried hot waxy crude pipelines are summarized from the two aspects of the internal heat transfer from the oil to the pipe and the external heat transfer from the pipe to the surrounding soil. The factors governing the heat transfer of buried pipelines are discussed, and various methods involved to solve heat transfer through surrounding soil, analytically and numerically, are discussed and compared. The complex heat transfer with phase transformation and moving boundary for shut-down waxy crude pipelines is described and methods to tackle this complex heat transfer problem are introduced. The thermal and hydraulic interaction problem accompanied with transient flow in hot oil pipelines and their solutions are discussed. Problems needed to be further studied in transient heat transfer for buried hot waxy crude pipelines are pointed out.