The socioeconomic development and decreases of relative benefits in rice production shift the dominant target of breeding from mainly seeking high yield potential to high efficiency in whole cycle in rice. The high efficiency breeding mainly consists of three aspects. The first is high efficiency technology in rice breeding. The molecular marker and gene chip technology can improve selection efficiency of elite genotypes, and the gene editing technology can efficiently create excellent allelic variations, as well as the transgenic technology can transfer outstanding characters cross species barriers. All of them are good approaches to raise breeding efficiency in rice. The second is high efficiency in productive characters of rice. High yield, environment-friendliness, and salubrity is basis for achieving high returns, and the good grain quality is a multiplier to increase per unit output benefit, then multiple resistances are a divisor to reduce the cost of each bushel, as well as the early maturity can ensure two cropping in one year. Only integration of the elite productive characters in one variety can realize the high efficiency output in each acre. The third is high efficiency in farming characters of rice. The direct seeding of rice in double cropping system is an efficient farming technique that requires rice to possess advantageous farming characters, such as cold tolerance at seedling and heading stages, anaerobic germination, and submergence tolerance. Chemical weeding demands herbicide resistance, and mechanical harvesting needs lodging resistance and good seed holding. Only rice with these efficient farming characters can achieve high efficiency tillage in rice production. Overall, high efficiency is a dominant target for current and future rice breeding.