1. The early 20th century to 1950s was the initial stage.

Germany, Britain, America and other countries have successfully developed martensitic, ferritic and austenitic stainless steels almost simultaneously. After about 40 years of development, in the early 1950s, the global stainless steel production was about 1 million tons. At this stage, the application of stainless steel is mainly in some fields with special requirements of corrosion resistance and high temperature resistance.

2. The 1950s to the mid-1980s was the development stage.

In 1950, the stainless steel industry in the United States took the lead in realizing civilian use, and the output of stainless steel gradually realized accelerated development. After another 40 years of development, by 1990, the global stainless steel output exceeded 10 million tons. During this period, stainless steel smelting technology, continuous casting technology and multi-roll cold rolling mill technology represented by out-of-furnace refining were successfully developed, which promoted the global scale development of stainless steel. At this stage, stainless steel began to enter ordinary people's homes, and the civilian level began to gradually expand.

3. Since the mid-1980s, it has experienced a period of rapid development to slow growth.

Market expansion period from 1990 to 2000; 2000-2016 accelerated development stage; Since 2016, the growth rate has slowed down.

Since 1990s, the development of stainless steel industry has broken through the traditional markets such as Europe, America and Japan, and started to develop into a broader emerging market. In 1990s, the first large-scale main production area in the history of global stainless steel industry was born, namely the European stainless steel market. After more than ten years of development, by 2002, the global stainless steel output exceeded 20 million tons.

In the 21st century, the global stainless steel industry has further accelerated its development. The output and consumption of stainless steel in developing countries continue to grow, especially the rapid economic development of China and other countries in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as the increase of consumption in the civil field, which has led to the rapid growth of global stainless steel output. However, the global financial crisis broke out in 2008, during which the output of stainless steel showed negative growth for two years. From 2010 to 2013, the global crude steel output kept double-digit growth, and China played a leading role.