Abstract The multispectral imaging technique is considered a reformation of hyperspectral imaging. It can be employed to noninvasively and rapidly evaluate food quality. Even though several imaging or sensor-based techniques have been conducted for the quality assessment of various food products, the rise of multispectral imaging has been more promising. This paper presents a comprehensive review of the use of the multispectral sensor in the quality assessment of plant foods (such as cereals, legumes, tubers, fruits, and vegetables). Different quality parameters (such as physicochemical and microbiological aspects) of plant-based foods that were determined and visualized by the combination of modeling methods and feature wavelength selection approaches are summarized. Based on the literature, the most frequently used wavelength selection methods are the successive projection algorithm (SPA) and the regression coefficient (RC). The most effective models developed for analyzing plant food products are the partial least squares regression (PLSR), least square support vector machine (LS-SVM), support vector machine (SVM), partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLSDA), and multiple linear regression (MLR). This article concludes with a discussion of challenges, potential uses, and future trends of this flourishing technique that is now also being applied to plant foods.