Abstract
The complex Ginzburg-Landau (CGL) equation which describes the soliton propagation in the presence of the detuning factor is firstly considered; then its solitons as well as Jacobi elliptic function solutions are obtained systematically using a modified Jacobi elliptic expansion method. In special cases, several dark and bright soliton solutions to the CGL equation are retrieved when the modulus of ellipticity approaches unity. The results presented in the current work can help to complete previous studies on the complex Ginzburg-Landau equation.