Abstract Counter-current chromatography (CCC) has been widely used as a preparative chromatography technique since Ito first developed it in the late 1960s. This technique uses a support-free liquid stationary phase, which is retained by gravity or centrifugal force. The analytes can access the whole stationary phase, leading to effective separation. In the past few decades, high-speed CCC has been a versatile preparative-scale separation technique, especially in isolation of natural products. The aim of this review is to describe different aspects of recent interesting applications in CCC, including instrumentation, solvent selection and elution methods.