This article is a systematic review of previous research on hate speech in discourse studies indexed in the Scopus database in the last five years, from 2015 to 2021. This review aims to map the main topics and methods used in hate speech studies and then provide critical remarks related to the methodological issues. The review focused on 70 selected articles and was analyzed using the NVivo 12 combined with the LancsBox 6.0. Based on the analysis, previous studies show a strong relationship between hate speech, political issues, and discrimination. Although many studies of hate speech have applied the CDA approach, and some of them have used sociocognitive CDA, it is surprising and unfortunate that previous researchers did not show much attention and further exploration of the cognitive aspects of the theory itself. It means that the cognitive aspects of hate speech have yet to be appropriately explored. © The Author(s) 2023.