Over the past decade, significant progress has been made in the management of rectal cancer. Advances in surgical technique and adjuvant therapies have led to significant improvements in outcome for some patients. The advances in preoperative therapies have led to the need for an accurate preoperative staging technique to select those patients who are expected to benefit from these interventions without subjecting others to unnecessary treatment. Performing neoadjuvant therapy knowledge of the relationship of the tumor to the circumferential resection margin is of importance. In Hungary, respecting European guidelines, the high resolution magnetic resonance imaging is mandatory in the staging of rectal cancer, and in early rectal cancer transrectal endosonography has a complementary role. The current role of multidetector computer tomography is for detecting distant metastasis and in local tumor staging of advanced cancers.