In this article, what is currently understood about the role that early experience has in the formation of habitat preferences is reviewed. The umbrella concept, Natal Habitat Preference Induction (NHPI), which includes a number of effects that natal experience has on later habitat preferences, is discussed. Habitat imprinting, a term which implies that early experience plays a much stronger role than later experiences in the formation of habitat preferences, is also discussed. The evidence that these effects occur in a broad taxonomic array of species is reviewed. Finally, hypotheses that have been offered to explain the adaptive value of NHPI and habitat imprinting are presented, and the implications of these effects for the ecology, evolution, management, and conservation of species are outlined.