The invention provides a portable snapshot array polarization multispectral imager and an imaging method in order to solve the problems that an existing snapshot array polarization multispectral imager is large in size and complex in restoration algorithm. The portable snapshot array polarization multispectral imager comprises a lens array, a multiband and polarization filter, a relay imaging coupling lens and a focal plane detector which are sequentially arranged along the same light path, the lens array is composed of m * n lenses, m > = 3, and n > = 3. Images formed by different lenses arenot overlapped. The multiband and polarization filter is an optical filter/film array composed of P spectral filters/films with different spectral bands and Q polarization filters/films with differentangles, P + Q = m * n, and Q = 3 or 4; wherein the Q polarization filters are in one-to-one correspondence with any Q lenses in the lens array, and the P spectrum filters are in one-to-one correspondence with the rest m * n-Q lenses in the lens array; and the relay imaging coupling lens is used for coupling an image formed by the lens array to the focal plane detector.