In this article, we will examine ultrafast spectroscopy techniques and applications, covering time-resolved infrared (TR-IR) spectroscopy, time resolved visible (TA) spectroscopy, two-dimensional infrared (2D-IR) spectroscopy, Kerr-gated Raman spectroscopy, time-resolved Raman and surface sum-frequency generation (SSFG) spectroscopy. In addition to introducing each technique, we will cover some basics, such as what kinds of lasers are used and discuss how these techniques are applied to study a diversity of chemical problems such as photocatalysis, photochemistry, electrocatalysis, battery electrode characterisation, zeolite characterisation and protein structural dynamics.