Since the end of the 19th century, fingermark identification has always been one of the most useful evidences of individual identification for criminal investigation worldwide. However, up to now the age determination of a fingermark remains a relatively unexplored area. The physical features of the fingermark ridges and chemical compositions of the fingermark residues vary remarkably with different donor characteristics, substrate properties and environmental variables. Moreover, the physical ridge features, molecular species and content of the chemical components in fingermark change dramatically with different storage factors and aging kinetics. Studying the ridge physical features, the initial chemical compositions of fingermark residues and their relationship with the fingermark age is a crucial topic in the forensic science field, because it contributes not only to the development of new fingermark detection approaches and techniques, but also to the correlating identification of fingermarks found at crime scenes. This review discusses the previous achievements of fingermark dating methods and techniques such as liquid chromatography, fluorescence spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy, ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, mass spectrometry and high-resolution imaging, and the limits for the application of such approaches in practice. Besides, the challenges and perspectives of developing a potentially more reliable methodology for fingermark age determination are described.