The ageing of populations worldwide is leading to an unprecedented increase in cancer cases and fatalities. Understanding the links between cancer and ageing is therefore more important than ever. How the interplay of ageing-associated changes affects cancer initiation and progression is complex, however, and some ageing processes probably foster cancer development whereas others hinder it, possibly in a tissue-specific manner. In the emerging age of cancer, how can our growing understanding of the biology of ageing inform cancer biology?