The advent of the human immunodeficiency virus and the increasing prevalence of immunocompromised individuals in the community have resulted in a resurgence of opportunistic infections, including oral candidoses. Despite the availability of a number of effective antimycotics for the management of oral candidoses, therapeutic failure is not uncommon. Further, the presence of many clinical variants of oral candidosis, both new and old, may confound the unwary clinician and complicate its management. These problems have been partly circumvented by the introduction of the triazole group of antimycotics, which initially appeared to be highly effective. However, an alarming increase in organisms resistant to triazoles has been reported recently. In this paper we provide an overview of clinical variants of oral candidosis. A second paper will discuss recent advances in the usage of antimycotics in the management of this condition.