The invention discloses a water bucket type wave motor. The water bucket type wave motor comprises a rotor and water buckets, wherein the rotor is cylindrical or annular, the water buckets are evenly distributed at the external circle of the rotor in the peripheral direction, each water bucket is of a water tank structure, openings of the water buckets are sequentially arranged along the periphery, the axis of a rotor shaft is slightly higher than the water surface and is parallel with the water surface, and the axis of the rotor shaft is roughly parallel with the bank. A one-way valve is installed on the lateral wall of each water bucket and corresponds to the opening of the corresponding water bucket, water can only enter through each one-way valve, and a water outlet is near the outer side of the bottom surface of each water bucket. Each water bucket is simple in structure, low in manufacturing cost and high in reliability. Due to the fact that the water bucket type wave motor directly collects and utilizes the potential energy of waves and floating force of water to drive the water buckets on the rotor to move for power generation, the wavy energy does not need a middle conversion procedure, and the utilization rate is high. If the geometric size of each water bucket is designed to be small, small broken waves can also be utilized.