In patients with operable esophageal cancer, there is evidence supporting the use of preoperative chemotherapy or preoperative chemoradiation. The addition of radiotherapy to chemotherapy seems more relevant for the more locally advanced cancers. There is a need to examine in trials more modern chemotherapy combinations with and without concurrent radiation and for research into assessing methods for predicting outcomes from neoadjuvant therapy as part of the paradigm of therapy for this disease.