The formation of the amide bond is of utmost importance in chemical synthesis. Amide-based compounds find their application in pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, 2 polymers, 3 etc. For example, around a quarter of marketed drugs contain an amide bond, and amide coupling is the most prevalent chemical transformation in drug discovery. At the same time, academic and industrial researchers call for improvement in the sustainability of chemical processes that lead to amides as a top priority, in line with the principles of green chemistry and sustainable development. Among different strategies for the preparation of amides, the most straightforward is the amidation of carboxylic acids and amines (Figure ). Their condensation using coupling reagents is the go-to approach for the large-scale preparation of amides. However, such an approach suffers from considerable sustainability drawbacks. In the activation step, stoichiometric amounts of coupling reagents are used to activate the carboxylic acids, thus making the carbonyl group more susceptible to a nucleophilic attack from the amine molecules. Although highly efficient, this approach yields large amounts of solvent waste and poor atom economy. Alternatively, solution-based direct catalysed amidation protocols with the frequently used boron and group (IV) metal catalysts are more favourable from the green chemistry perspective. Yet, catalysed amidations still face a few challenges, for example, problems with catalyst loadings and recyclability as well as limited substrate scopes, not to mention that such reactions remain developed in solution, which does not help to reduce waste production. Fig. Overview of the main strategies for the amidation of carboxylic acids and amines.