Interest in cartilage defect repair has been rapidly increasing with the growing number of sportsrelatedinjuries, traumas, congenital defects, and pathological disorders, for example, resulting inosteoarthritis (OA), a complex degenerative joint disease that affects a large number of people everyyear. Although modern medicine has entered into an advanced stage, current surgical proceduresstill have several limitations. At present, among all therapeutic approaches, tissue engineering hasshown great potential for cartilage joint repair. Several methodologies of utilizing cells, scaffolds,and signalling molecules have been explored and developed. However, in regenerative cartilagetherapies, one of the major challenges yet to be overcome is its inability to regenerate functionaltissue owing to poor mass transfer, and limited ability in controlling physiocochemical culturalparameters during in vitro cell culture. To solve these problems, bioreactors can play a promisingrole because of their ability to control physiocochemical culture parameters and to providemechanical stimulation, thereby inducing improved chondrogenesis of tissue-engineered cartilage.In this paper, we review the role of bioreactors in repairing articular cartilage defects with recentadvancements in these two areas.