Arylxanthones and arylacridones although not yet found in nature are becoming an important group of heterocyclic compounds due to their promising biological activities. Their central cores, xanthone and acridone, are recognized as interesting motifs for drug development mainly to be used in antitumour chemotherapy. The synthesis of this type of compounds is still scarce but several successful examples were recently published and a large variety of arylated xanthone and acridone derivatives were prepared. A systematic survey of the literature dedicated to their synthesis will be presented and discussed in this review.