From the Darwin’s time to the 21st century the climbing habit and tendril movements of plants continue to fascinate the biologists. Among flowering plants about 94 dicotyledonous families and about 10 monocotyledonous families have climbing species. The starting clades of flowering plants have families with climbing habit. Climbing habit is rare in vascular cryptogams and in gymnosperms. But climbing hooks and tendrils have been discovered in the seed ferns. Origin of the climbing habit in vascular plants initiated after the move of the plants to the land habitat. Some of the plants became climbers in order to reach the light and expose leaf surface to free air. Climbing plants are dependent on the availability of physical support to reach the canopy and in this way they prevent shading by neighbouring plants. Climbers that find a suitable support usually have a higher biomass and reproductive output than those that grow unsupported. The evolution of the biomechanical climbing architecture have triggered by basal apomorphic constraints, complexification, simplification and developmental loss. The biomechanics of the climbing stems are controlled by presence or absence of secondary growth and the number, complexity and coordination of development of primary and secondary tissues. The climbing architecture developed with a duality between an initial self-support phase and a later climbing phase. The anatomical novelty of climbing plants is surprising and the outcome of it is the frequency of anomaly in climbers that include unusual functioning of cambia, development of accessory cambia, or due to both. However, the diversity of anomaly cannot be used as a reliable guide to the phylogeny. Climbers typically have a high ratio of supported leaf weight to xylem areas, i.e., low Huber value. Vines have greater performance and fitness than those that remain prostrate. The location of a suitable support is the key process in the life history of climbing plants.