The invention belongs to the communication field, and in particular relates to a design method of a MAC layer transmission protocol with limited control overhead. The present invention includes initializing and generating DATA message, sending RTS message, receiving RTS message, sending CTS message, receiving CTS message, sending DATA message, receiving DATA message, sending REQ message, receiving REQ message, sending SRQ message, receiving SRQ message, sending ACK message, receiving ACK message and other processing processes, the present invention judges its own report by monitoring the channel reservation request RTS message sent by the next-hop node and the REQ message of the next-hop node. The correctness of the text transmission, so as to adjust and change the path information in time to solve the problem of avoiding the failure of the relay node and the repair of the interrupted transmission link; within the limited control overhead, no additional control message field is added, effectively avoiding the problem caused by the transmission link. Network congestion or even paralysis caused by road failure, thereby enhancing the robustness of message transmission links, improving the network life cycle, and making it more suitable for wireless sensor networking requirements.