Abstract: Renewable energy resources(RES) have been increasingly adopted in power generation towards carbon neutrality. Among those, solar photovoltaic(PV) is one of the most favorable RESs, which has been widely used across the globe. Being the core of solar PV energy conversion systems, power electronics associated with advanced control is of importance, e.g., optimizing the energy harvesting. As such, innovative power converter topologies and control schemes have been developed in the literature to continuously improve the system performance(e.g., efficiency). Yet, at the same time, challenging issues like stability and reliability should be outlined, which, however, are not addressed thoroughly in the literature, in order to develop novel strategies to enhance the grid operation with more PV systems(and/or other RESs) that are heavily relied on power electronics converters. With the above, this paper aims to overview the power conversion and grid integration technologies of solar PV systems. Specifically, the key components of grid-connected PV systems, i.e., the solar PV cell, power conversion technologies, and control solutions for grid-connected applications, are comprehensively discussed. Additionally, emerging technologies like power-to-X based on PV systems are briefed. Several research perspectives are outlined to further advance solar PV technology and its grid applications.