Satellite cloud image is a kind of useful image which includes abundant information, for acquired this information, the image processing and character extraction method adapt to satellite cloud image has to be used. Content-based satellite cloud image processing and information retrieval (CBIPIR) is a very important problem in image processing and analysis field. The basic character, like color, texture, edge and shape was extracted from the cloud image, and then the satellite cloud image database was provided to store the basic character information. Since traditional image retrieval method has some limitation, for realized image retrieval accurately and quickly, the CBIR method is adaptive. On the basis of the key technology of CBIPIR was studied, we could obtain the better retrieval effect, and the image retrieval result was shown in detail. The experiment result proves that the research and application of content-based satellite cloud image processing is valuable, which could improve the professional image application efficiency more.