PurposeThis article investigates recent studies of construction law in different areas, including civil engineering; construction building technology; transportation; multidisciplinary studies and the environment, as well as their changing trends in the years between 2000 and 2019.Design/methodology/approachThe transformation trend of construction law is investigated based on collecting main keywords from the Web of Science (WoS) database selectively from different viewpoints and using Scientometric Analysis by CiteSpace and HistCite software. The top journals, top universities, and the most active countries in publishing and expanding construction law, keyword co-occurrence network, top keywords with the strongest citation bursts, cluster analysis, the most cited articles are determined both generally and yearly.FindingsBy interpreting the Scientometric results, focal points of legal issues and their changing trends during the last two decades are reviewed. Scholars’ data concerning interesting topics, construction law industry future needs, knowledge gaps, and speculation about future views and direction are obtained.Research limitations/implicationsRestrictions on data search, limiting the category of studies to a specific domain, and limiting research time to 20 years are some limitations of this article.Social implicationsAll these results address legal issues, comprehensive laws, plenary contracts, and efficient dispute resolution based on cultures and themes.Originality/valueGiven the importance of legal issues at all stages of the construction cycle, a review of this multidisciplinary and new science over the past two decades can provide hot issues, knowledge gaps, and a better view of the future.