The present article presents a critically reviewed state of the art of naturally occurring and synthetically designed degradable polymer materials being invested for theranostic applications especially focused to controlled drug delivery and tissue engineering technologies. The review article highlights the origin, classification, properties and applications of a variety of naturally occurring charged biomacromolecules like alginic acid, pectin, xanthate gum, hylarunic acid, and chitosan and its derivatives. Moreover, synthetic polymers with degradation characteristics such as aliphatic...