The invention provides an active optical module multi-channel automatic test system and a method. optimal signals emitted by a tested optical module are monitored, and indexes of the incident light power, emission current, bias current, temperature, voltage, extinction ratio, eye diagram allowance, crossing point, OMA (optical modulation amplitude) etc. are measured and calculated; if the above indexes are all in accordance with the standard, the sensitivity of the optical module is tested, the emission optical power of the tested module is enabled to reach the sensitivity of the test standard via the adjustment of an attenuator, and error code tests are conducted; and if there is no error code, indexes of alarm value and alarm recovery etc. of the optical module are tested. According to the test system, an error detector, an optical module test board, an optical power meter, and the attenuator employed by the test system are all multi-channel devices, an optical switch and an optical splitter are combined for time-sharing multiplexing of one oscilloscope, at least 8 modules can be simultaneously tested, the utilization rate of the oscilloscope and the test efficiency of the optical module are greatly optimized, the equipment cost and the manual cost are reduced, and automatic and batch production of the optical modules is realized.