Scientifical applying research method is an effective way to enhance the academic competitiveness of library and information science, and it is helpful to understand the overall trend of international academic research by investigating the method structure of library and information science overseas. 275 papers of international first-class journals about library and information science were divided into 2013 and 2018 time windows to carry out content analysis and analyze application of the methods. Results show that calculation test (35.06%), statistical analysis (16.45%) and content analysis (11.26%) are the main empirical methods overseas in recent years, and the overall proportion of empirical research and theoretical research tends to be stable. Overseas LIS discipline has developed into a pattern with empirical research as the leading and theoretical research as the auxiliary.