Abstract:A high-level radioactive waste repository is a kind of special underground rock engineering with many characteristics and special design methodology. The characteristics of repository as an underground engineering are summarized;and the major contents,design processes and factors to be taken into account are briefly introduced by taking the design of Swedish repository in stage D1 as an example. Finally some design-related issues are discussed,such as the function and lifetime of the repository,conceptive design,general requirements,temperature limitation,main issues for repositories in different host rocks,design requirements for retrieval and the cost of repository.