Over the past two decades, DNA vaccination has been developed as a method for the induction of immune responses. However, in spite of high expectations based on their efficacy in preclinical models, immunogenicity of first generation DNA vaccines in clinical trials was shown to be poor, and no DNA vaccines have yet been licensed for human use. In recent years significant progress has been made in the development of second generation DNA vaccines and DNA vaccine delivery methods. Here we review the key characteristics of DNA vaccines as compared to other vaccine platforms, and recent insights into the prerequisites for induction of immune responses by DNA vaccines will be discussed. We illustrate the development of second generation DNA vaccines with the description of DNA tattooing as a novel DNA delivery method. This technique has shown great promise both in a small animal model and in non-human primates and is currently under clinical evaluation.