Vaginal delivery is an important route of drug administration for both local and systemic diseases. The vaginal route has some advantages due to its large surface area, rich blood supply, avoidance of the first-pass effect, relatively high permeability to many drugs including large molecular weight drugs, such as peptides and proteins and self-insertion. The vaginal route appears to be highly appropriate for bioadhesive drug delivery systems in order to retain drugs for treating largely local conditions, or for use in contraception. In particular, protection against sexually-transmitted diseases is critical. To prolong the residence time in the vaginal cavity, bioadhesive therapeutic systems have been developed in the form of semi-solid and solid dosage forms. This review, therefore, summarizes various vaginal drug delivery systems with an introduction to vaginal physiology, factors affecting drug absorption from the vaginal route, applications and also provides an overview of various currently available vaginal drug delivery systems in the market.