<p>The giant panda (<i>Ailuropoda melanoleuca</i>) is a rare species endemic to China, and also serves as a flagship species for global biodiversity conservation. Elucidating its evolutionary history is of great significance for conservation efforts. However, knowledge about the demographic changes and adaptive evolution of the giant panda remains limited. Paleogenomic research, with its broad temporal and geographic coverage, provides a novel perspective for addressing these questions. Given this, this study discusses three core topics related to the evolution of the giant panda. Firstly, we systematically consolidated the fossil records from the Late Miocene to the Holocene, along with their related studies, illustrating the impact of climatic and anthropogenic factors on the demographic history of the giant panda. In particular, climate change served as the primary driver of population fluctuations during the Pleistocene, leading to two episodes of population expansion and bottleneck. Additionally, human activities played a significant role in population divergence and demographic changes during the Holocene. Secondly, we also elucidated the adaptive process of the giant panda in terms of their highly specialized diet, highlighting long-term adaptation in morphology, genetics, and gut microbiota composition, which have led to its unique adaptive traits. Finally, the potential and significance of the paleogenomic studies in deepening our understanding of the demographic history and adaptive evolution of the giant panda were discussed. Meanwhile, this study demonstrated the potential of paleogenomic approaches for resolving species identification and obtaining individual-level information from fossil specimens, using ancient samples excavated from Baling in Shaanxi and Bamianshan in Hunan as case studies.</p>