Emerging issues on fuel price and greenhouse gas emissions have attracted attention on the alternative energy sources, especially in transportation sector. The transportation sector accounts for 40% of total fuel consumption. Thus, an increasing number of studies have been conducted on hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) and their energy management system (EMS). This paper focuses on reviews of EMSs for fuel cell (FC) based HEV in combination with battery and super-capacitor, respectively. Various aspects and classifications of fuel cell–HEV EMS are explained in this paper. Different types of FC–HEV control models and algorithms derived from simulation and experiment are explained in details for an analytical justification for the most optimal control strategy. The performances of the various combinations of FC–HEV system are summarized in the table along with relevant references. This paper provides comprehensive survey of FC–HEV on their source combination, models, energy management system (EMS) etc. developed by various researchers. From the rigorous review, it is observed that the existing technologies more or less are capable to perform well; however, the reliability and the intelligent systems are still not up to the mark. Accordingly, current issues and challenges on the FC–HEV technologies are highlighted with a brief suggestions and discussion for the progress of future FC–HEV vehicle research. This review will hopefully lead to increasing efforts towards the development of economic, longer lifetime, hydrogen viable, efficient electronic interface and well performed EMS for future FC–HEV.