In this invited Perspective, recent developments and possible future directions of research on photoactive coordination compounds made from nonprecious transition metal elements will be discussed. The focus is on conceptually new, structurally well-characterized complexes with excited-state lifetimes between 10 ps and 1 ms in fluid solution for possible applications in photosensitizing, light-harvesting, luminescence and catalysis. The key metal elements considered herein are Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Zr, Mo, W and Ce in various oxidation states equipped with diverse ligands, giving access to long-lived excited states via a range of fundamentally different types of electronic transitions. Research performed in this area over the past five years demonstrated that a much broader spectrum of metal complexes than what was long considered relevant exhibits useful photophysics and photochemistry.