The invention relates to a lithium ion battery cathode material and a preparation method thereof, a cathode and a lithium ion battery. The cathode material comprises doped lithium nickel cobalt manganate particles, wherein the structural formula of the doped lithium nickel cobalt manganate particles is Li (NixCoyMn1-x-y-p-qM1pM2q)O2, M1 is a metal element comprising Zr and / or Mg, M2 is Al, Ti, La,B, F or Mo, or a combination of two or three or four of them, wherein 0.6<=x<=0.8, 0.1<=y<= 0.2, 0.0006<=p<= 0.0018, 0.0055<=q<=0.013; The ratio of the peak intensity I (003) of the peak (003) and the peak intensity I (104) of the peak (104) of the XRD spectrum of the doped nickel cobalt manganate lithium particles is 1.20<=I (003) / I (104)<= 1.30; The (104) diffraction peak of the doped lithium nickel cobalt manganate particles has a full width at half maximum of 0.22 to 0.25. The cathode material of the lithium ion battery disclosed by the invention has high specific capacity, and also improves the rate performance, cycle performance and safety performance of the cathode material. The method disclosed by the invention has the advantages of small doping amount, simple operation, easy control and low production cost, and is suitable for industrial large-scale production.