Carotid chemodectoma (CC) (carotid glomus tumor, carotid tumor, carotid paraganglioma, carotid gland struma) is in most cases a benign, slow-growing tumor from paraganglionic cells of the carotid glomus. Glomus tumors account for 60–70 % of all paragangliomas of the head and neck. This article describes in detail the anatomy of the carotid glomus, histological types of tumors and the causes of their formation. A special role is given to the clinical picture in this pathology and modern methods of instrumental diagnostics. Modern CT surgery has established a correlation between anatomical classification and the severity of surgical resection complications, which allows neurosurgeons to predict blood loss and neurological complications in each patient. Operations to remove the carotid glomus with a chemodectomy are complex and technically different from classical operations on the carotid arteries. Despite the possibility of chemoradiotherapy with chemodect, surgical remains the main method of treatment.