Rock-socketed piles have been widely used in engineering practice because of its high bearing capacity and small pile group effect. As an important parameter, the bearing capacity of single pile is usually time-consuming and laborious to obtain easily through test methods such as static load test. Therefore, there are many convenient methods to estimate the vertical bearing capacity of single rock-socketed pile, such as standard methods, theoretical methods and empirical formula methods. Considering the lack of systematic research on how to select the appropriate method to calculate vertical bearing capacity of rock-socketed pile, this article summarizes the similarities and differences of different standard methods, theoretical methods and empirical formula methods, and combines engineering projects to systematically compare the applicability of these different three types of methods. The results show that the accuracy of these method for estimating the bearing capacity of rock-socketed piles depends more on the similarity between the hypothetical load characteristics of the rock-socketed piles and the actual load characteristics than the number of required parameters. The results of theoretical methods are more accurate than those of empirical formula methods because of its specific physical meaning. Among the standards, the load bearing behavior expressed by calculation formulas of《Technical Code for Building Pile Foundation》and 《Specification for Design of Foundation of Highway Bridges and Culverts》are closer to the actual situation, thus, theirs calculational results are more accurate. Finally, according to the analysis, some suggestions for selection of calculation methods for estimating the vertical ultimate bearing capacity of rock-socketed pile and their error source analysis are put forward.