The invention discloses a special catalyst for preparing o-chlorobenzonitrile by an ammoxidation method. A carrier of the special catalyst is organic silicon modified silica gel, a main catalyst comprises three components of V, P and rare earth metal Re, and a cocatalyst comprises at least one of three components of D, E and G; the active component of the catalyst is represented by VPRe<c>D<d>E<e>G<g>O<x>; the rare earth metal Re is lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, promethium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium, lutetium or scandium; D is titanium, chromium, molybdenum, manganese, antimony or bismuth; E is boron, iron, cobalt, nickel, zinc or tin; and G is lithium, sodium, potassium, caesium, magnesium or calcium. The invention also discloses a preparation method and application of the catalyst. The rare earth metal is used for adjusting the acidity and alkalinity, the oxidation-reduction capacity and the coordinationcapacity with reactants of the catalyst, and improving the activity of the catalyst and the selectivity of products, and the service life of the industrial catalyst is prolonged by utilizing organic silicon to reinforce the action of an inorganic oxide and the carrier. The catalyst is simple in preparation method and good in thermal stability and mechanical strength.