The invention discloses a hybrid electric vehicle energy optimization method based on battery life attenuation mode identification. The control method comprises the following steps that energy management optimization control strategies under a China passenger vehicle working condition, a new European driving cycle (NEDC) working condition and a highway fuel economy test (HWFET) working condition are generated respectively for a hybrid electric vehicle, and the sums of the fuel consumption costs and the battery life attenuation costs of stages are taken as an optimized objective function; and the battery life attenuation mode under each working condition is classified based on the result of solution based on a discrete dynamic programming algorithm, finally a battery life attenuation mode is identified based on the neural network, and a control strategy which can be applied to a real vehicle online in real time under the corresponding mode is established. According to the hybrid electric vehicle energy optimization method based on the battery life attenuation mode identification, based on the working condition dimension, the battery life attenuation rule is extracted, the battery life attenuation mode is identified, the battery life attenuation degree is effectively relieved, the fuel economy is guaranteed, and the accuracy of a system on the battery life prediction under an actual driving condition and the adaptability of the system to the actual driving condition are improved.