Abstract The seemingly contradictory state of research on short-range order in many-component alloys is addressed through a critical review of the characterization of face-centered-cubic 3d systems. Despite the paucity of direct observations, the ordering of many widely studied alloys is argued to be primarily interesting for its potential ubiquity. To clarify this situation, future research directions are proposed with reference to historical results, including a review of the fundamental principles of ordering and clustering. Graphical abstract