The development of cascade reactions that realize step-economical syntheses of complex compounds by multiple bond formation is one of the most attractive subjects in modern organic chemistry. Another important challenge in this area is to improve atom economy by minimizing waste product formation and avoiding prefunctionalization of the substrates. Because palladium catalysts are well known to promote a variety of atom-economical elementary reactions, many useful palladium-catalyzed cascade reactions have been developed. In this Focus Review, recent advances in palladium-catalyzed atom-economical cascade reactions for the construction of polycyclic compounds are summarized. Especially, the cascade reactions reported in the past decade, which include carbopalladation onto alkyne/alkene/allenes, nucleophilic reaction, and direct arylation/C À H bond functionalization, are highlighted.