Metaheuristic algorithms are found to be more effective and helpful in working out on complex problems (e.g., optimization and mining, etc.). This chapter presents a survey with a brief overview of the cuckoo algorithm, its latest developments, as well as recommendation for the applications in various disciplines. The presented survey analyzes the algorithm search insight, its Lévy flight strategy, and search mechanism efficiency. It was found that despite being capable of solving various complex and multimodal problems researcher further improves cuckoo search algorithm performance. The chapter presents the cuckoo search algorithm, and explains the variants and hybrids of the cuckoo algorithm. Further, the chapter unveils various complex problems of science and engineering where the algorithm can be applied successfully with better convergence and global optimization results.