Even though there are many articles related to the review of biodiesel production from edible and inedible vegetable oils, the performance and exhaust emissions of compression ignition (CI) engines fueled with vegetable oils and their derivatives, and the effect of vegetable oils and their derivatives on spray characteristics were not considered in those reviews. The high viscosity of vegetable oils and their derivatives is one of the main problems in their application to CI engines as a substitute fuel. Therefore, how vegetable oils and their derivatives affect spray characteristics in CI engines is the main concern of this study. Of edible vegetable oils, soybean, rapeseed, and palm oils have primarily been investigated. Of inedible vegetable oils, jatropha, karanja, rubber seed, and used cooking oils were of the main concern on the research of spray characteristics in CI engines. Spray angle, spray penetration, and liquid phase penetration were primarily examined among the macroscopic spray characteristics and the Sauter mean diameter was only investigated among the microscopic spray characteristics. It was found that so many different definitions of spray angle have been suggested by various researchers. The evaluation of empirical correlations, which are different from the existing ones, for the calculation of spray penetration for biodiesel in the early stage of injection is required. The original vegetable oil used in the production of biodiesel affects the spray characteristics and quality of atomization.