This paper provides a review of the most recent works in electronic noses used in the food industry. Focus is placed on the applications within food quality monitoring that is, meat, milk, fish, tea, coffee and wines. This paper demonstrates that there is a strong commonality between the different application area in terms of the sensors used and the data processing algorithms applied. Further, this paper provides a critical outlook on the developments needed in this field for transitioning from research platforms to industrial instruments applied in real contexts. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.