This brief review describes applications of cyclometallated iridium complexes for energy saving organic light-emitting devices (OLED's) and energy generating molecular photovoltaic cells. The first part consists of a short overview of the methods to modulate emitted color and quantum yield in neutral and ionic complexes for light-emitting diodes. And in the second part, we report initial results of cyclometallated iridium complexes for solar cell applications. (C) 2009 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.