The development of new electrode materials for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) is always being a focal area of material science, as the current technology may not be able to meet the high energy demands for electronic devices with better performances. Among all the metal oxides, tin dioxide (SnO₂) is regarded as a promising candidate to serve as the anode material for LIBs due to its high theoretical capacity. The paper starts with an overview of the syntheses of phase-pure SnO₂ hierarchical structures with different morphologies such as nanorods, nanosheets and nanospheres, as well as their modifications by doping and composing with other materials. The design of SnO₂-based nanostructures with improved performances and the challenges in the areas of lithium-ion batteries were described.