The invention discloses a red carbon dot material, a preparation method and application thereof, and belongs to the technical field of preparation of luminous carbon nanometer materials. In the present invention, a specific carbon source and phosphate are dispersed in water for hydrothermal reaction to construct a singlet oxygen yield, high photostability, good water solubility, high phototoxicity, low dark toxicity, and in the phototherapy window. There are red fluorescent carbon dots with strong absorption within 600-1000nm, which can be widely used as photosensitizer in the preparation of photodynamic therapy cancer drugs, construction of drug delivery systems, fluorescence imaging, light-emitting devices and biosensing, etc., and has a very good market prospect.