The invention discloses a method for preparing near-infrared carbon quantum dots by using fuchsin as a carbon source. The method comprises the following steps: weighing 1.0000g of yellow ginger extraction residues, putting into a 50mL hydrothermal reaction kettle, adding 40mL of secondary water, putting in a drying box, reacting at 200 DEG C for 2 hours, after the reaction finishes, cooling to room temperature, and filtering to obtain the carbon quantum dot solution; dissolving 0.01507g of fuchsin, and adding the solvent to a constant volume in a 50mL volumetric flask to obtain a 1.0*10<-3> mol / L fuchsin solution; adding the fuchsin solution and carbon quantum dot solution into a 50mL reaction kettle, uniformly mixing, adding secondary water until the total reaction volume is 40mL, putting in a drying box, and reacting at 220 DEG C for 4 hours; and after the reaction finishes, cooling to room temperature, and filtering to obtain the near-infrared carbon quantum dots. The near-infrared carbon quantum dots prepared by the method have the advantages of stable properties and high fluorescence intensity, and have application prospects in the fields of biological imaging, sensing, drug transfer, photocatalysis, biological living imaging and the like.