Permanent modification is an important recent development in chemical modification techniques which is promising in view of increasing sample throughput with 'fast' programs, reducing reagent blanks, preliminary elimination of unwanted modifier components, compatibility with on-line and in situ enrichment, etc. An overview of this approach based on the authors' recent research and scarce literature data is given, revealing both success and failure in studies with permanently modified surfaces (carbides, non-volatile noble metals, noble metals on carbide coatings, etc.), as demonstrated in examples of direct electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometric (ETAAS) applications to biological and environmental matrices and vapor generation (VG)-ETAAS coupling with in-atomizer trapping of hydrides and other analyte vapors. Permanent modifiers exhibit certain drawbacks and limitations such as: poorly reproducible treatment technologies - eventually resulting in poor tube-to-tube repeatability and double or multiple peaks; impaired efficiency compared with modifier addition to each sample aliquot; relatively short lifetimes; limitations imposed on temperature programs, the pyrolysis, atomization and cleaning temperatures being set somewhat lower to avoid excessive loss of modifier; applicability to relatively simple sample solutions rather than to high-salt matrices and acidic digests; side effects of overstabilization, etc. The most important niches of application appear to be the utilization of permanently modified surfaces in coupled VG-ETAAS techniques, analysis of organic solvents and extracts, concentrates and fractions obtained after enrichment and/or speciation separations and direct ETAAS determinations of highly volatile analytes in relatively simple sample matrices. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.