Over the past 60 years, gas chromatography (
GC
) has been developed into the most powerful separation technique for volatile compounds. This chapter describes milestones in this success story, classic and recent developments in modern instrumentation of
GC
, current applications and trends as well as future perspectives, and how they fit together. Sections discuss novel stationary phases, comprehensive
GC
,
GC
detectors, the referencing of
GC
data as well as instrumental miniaturization, applications in the analysis of fatty acids, flavor compounds, pollutants and drugs as well as special sections on direct enantiomer separations using modified cyclodextrins, inverse gas chromatography, and microgas chromatographic separations.