Headache is one of the ten most common reasons for consulting with a doctor. Healthcare community is seeking to identify nature-based drugs with no side effects and a higher efficiency for treating headache. This review article introduced the plants used to treat headache in ethnobotany and traditional culture of different regions of Iran. The key words consisting of ethnobotany, ethnopharmacology, ethnomedicine, phytopharmacology, traditional medicine, phytomedicine, and Iran, accompanied with headache, pain and analgesic, were used to search for relevant publications in PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Islamic World Science Citation Center, and Magiran. Overall, 59 medicinal plants from 29 families are used to treat headache specifically in Iranian traditional medicine. Most plants presented in this study were analgesic and anti-inflammatory, and affected the inflammation and cortical vascular contractile dysfunction. Because of the widespread use of traditional medicinal plants and wide acceptance of herbal drugs and traditional medicine, large studies in pharmacy and pharmacology areas are recommended to inform pharmaceutical industries.
