Coupling map lattice is an efficient mathematical model for studying complex systems. This paper studies the topology identification of coupled map lattice (CML) under the sparsity condition. We convert the identification problem into the problem of solving the underdetermined linear equations. The l1 norm method is used to solve the underdetermined equations. The requirement of data characters and sampling times are discussed in detail. We find that the high entropy and small coupling coefficient data are suitable for the identification. When the measurement time is more than 2.86 times sparsity, the accuracy of identification can reach an acceptable level. And when the measurement time reaches 4 times sparsity, we can receive a fairly good accuracy.