Objective: To perform a literature review on oral squamous cell carcinoma, the presence of cancer stem cells; their association with the course of the disease and therapeutic applications. Methods: A search was performed in the PubMed database by entering the following algorithm: ((((neoplastic stem cells[MeSH Terms]) OR (Cancer stem cells[Text Word])) AND (Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck[MeSH Terms])) AND (Oral squamous cell carcinoma[Text Word]), to find articles in english published between 2012 and 2022. The PRISMA diagram was used to identify and select the articles. Results: A result of 49 articles was obtained; of which 27 were chosen according to the title and abstract in their association with the topic. In addition, 8 additional articles suggested by their relationship with the information previously searched were included. In total, 35 articles were evaluated. There h...