The evaluation of social practice outcomes is a critical component of the social practice mechanisms in colleges and universities, serving as a core index to assess the effectiveness of practice activities and the quality of student training. This paper employs CiteSpace to analyze references, keyword co-occurrence maps, time zone maps, and time diagrams, identifying key research hotspots in social practice evaluation systems domestically and internationally. These hotspots include the construction of evaluation indicators, evaluation pathways, and methods. Additionally, this study compares and summarizes the evolution of social practice evaluation systems across regions. It highlights that foreign social practice evaluation systems are characterized by diverse interpretative paradigms, an emphasis on students’ self-reflection during the evaluation process, and more robust theoretical foundations. These findings provide valuable insights for domestic colleges and universities seeking to build social practice evaluation systems with relevant content and effective results.