The invention discloses a CAD semantic model search method based on a design intent. The method comprises the steps of A, establishing a three-dimensional CAD model database and carrying out three-dimensional annotation of the design intent through utilization of a PMI module of UG according to modeling, analyzing and manufacturing features of each model; B, carrying out classification on the annotation information of three-dimensional models according to modeling information, analyzing information and manufacturing information, and establishing a design intent semantic tree of each model; C, establishing a field-based body semantic model tree according to a three-dimensional semantic tree database; D, establishing a search index according to the body semantic tree; E, comparing similarity of a target search word set and semantic tree nodes and returning the same or similar nodes and sub-nodes thereof; and F, calculating corresponding model semantic similarity according to the returned nodes, returning the three-dimensional models with high semantic similarity and feeding back the three-dimensional models to a user. According to the method, the semantic gap problem of the content-based search method is solved, the similarity calculation is carried out by matching target search words and semantic annotation words, and the recall ratio of search is improved.