The invention relates to an LED large-area controllable surface coarsening and etching method based on a laser, belonging to the technical field of an LED. The method utilizes semiconductor material for carrying out strong absorption generating gasification on high-power laser with the wavelength less than the band edge absorption wavelength of the semiconductor material, thus realizing surface coarsening for the semiconductor material on the surface of the LED. A high-speed galvanometer or a precise displacement platform is used for controlling the laser processing area or pattern, and can be used for controlling the laser power and the processing line width and depth of focus level adjustment. The LED large-area controllable surface coarsening and etching method can be applied to surface coarsening and etching of the GaAs-based LED and the GaN-based LED of various structures. The laser takes the wavelength less than the band edge absorption wavelength of the processed semiconductor material as reference. The method has the advantages of wide applicable material, rapid processing speed, large area, low cost, good coarsening effect, low damage for the semiconductor material, high controllability of system processing parameters and the like, can effectively solve the problem of p-GaN layer coarsening, and has great application potential in the production of the high-brightness LED.