Staging of lung cancer serves 2 purposes; it attempts to classify patients into groups where particular treatments are appropriate and defines those groups based on expected prognosis. The eighth edition of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer staging system deals with the issues raised by screening with fine cut computed tomography. Each phase of staging is a legitimate dataset on its own. Molecular profiling of lung cancer has led to the development of an increasing number of novel agents to treat systemic disease. Prognosis is increasingly determined by genetic susceptibility of the specific cancer.