A method for recovering valuable metals from waste lithium ion batteries, including the following steps: step 1: pre-treatment short-circuit discharging, dismantling, crushing, roasting, and screening on waste lithium ion batteries to obtain active electrode powders; the waste lithium ion battery is one or more of the waste lithium nickel oxide lithium ion battery, lithium cobalt oxide lithium ion battery, lithium manganese oxide lithium ion battery, and lithium nickel cobalt manganese oxide lithium ion battery; step 2: alkaline cleaning and filtering using alkaline solution to wash the active electrode powders, then filtering to remove copper and aluminum; step 3: drying and mixing drying the activated electrode powder after alkaline washing treatment, mixing the dried activated electrode powder with starch with an amount of starch controlled at 5 - 20 wt.%, and then adding concentrated sulfuric acid at a solid-liquid ratio of 50 - 300 g/L and stir evenly to obtain the mixed material; step 4: high temperature reduction putting the mixed material into a corundum crucible, and then moving the corundum crucible into a tube furnace to calcine under controlled atmosphere; and wherein a calcination temperature is set at 300 - 800 °C, a heating rate at 10 °C/min, and a calcination time at 30 - 180 min; and wherein the controlled atmosphere is a mixture of O2 and N2, and the volume fraction of O2 is controlled between 0 - 50 %; step 5: water leaching and filtration taking out the product obtained from calcination in the step 4 and using deionized water to extract the leachate and leaching residue with valence metal ions, and then obtaining the leachate after filtering. step 1: pre-treatment short-circuit discharging, dismantling, crushing, roasting, and screening on waste lithium ion batteries to obtain active electrode powders; the waste lithium ion battery is one or more of the waste lithium nickel oxide lithium ion battery, lithium cobalt oxide lithium ion battery, lithium manganese oxide lithium ion battery, and lithium nickel cobalt manganese oxide lithium ion battery; step 2: alkaline cleaning and filtering using alkaline solution to wash the active electrode powders, then filtering to remove copper and aluminum; step 3: drying and mixing drying the activated electrode powder after alkaline washing treatment, mixing the dried activated electrode powder with starch with an amount of starch controlled at 5 - 20 wt.%, and then adding concentrated sulfuric acid at a solid-liquid ratio of 50 - 300 g/L and stir evenly to obtain the mixed material; step 4: high temperature reduction putting the mixed material into a corundum crucible, and then moving the corundum crucible into a tube furnace to calcine under controlled atmosphere; and wherein a calcination temperature is set at 300 - 800 °C, a heating rate at 10 °C/min, and a calcination time at 30 - 180 min; and wherein the controlled atmosphere is a mixture of O2 and N2, and the volume fraction of O2 is controlled between 0 - 50 %; step 5: water leaching and filtration taking out the product obtained from calcination in the step 4 and using deionized water to extract the leachate and leaching residue with valence metal ions, and then obtaining the leachate after filtering.