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Anti-angiogenic therapy cuts off the tumour's blood supply; it is now mostly used to help immunotherapy work better.
Anti-angiogenic therapy blocks VEGF signalling, which normalises the tumour vasculature and reduces immunosuppressive myeloid cells rather than simply starving the tumour. The drugs include bevacizumab, ramucirumab, and VEGFR TKIs. Alone they extend PFS modestly, with a small single-agent benefit; with PD-1 blockade they are standard in RCC, HCC (atezolizumab-bevacizumab), and endometrial cancer (lenvatinib-pembrolizumab). PD-1×VEGF bispecifics are the consolidation of this idea into a single molecule. Hypertension, bleeding, and proteinuria are the class toxicities. The simple version is that these drugs cut off the tumour's blood supply, and their main modern role is helping immunotherapy work better.
Blockade of VEGF signalling normalises vasculature and reduces immunosuppressive myeloid cells.
Anlotinib is one of the most used cancer pills in China, first approved for lung cancer after other treatments have failed and then for several rarer tumours.
Axitinib is a selective VEGF-receptor pill, now given mainly with pembrolizumab or avelumab as first-line kidney cancer treatment.
Bevacizumab is a humanised antibody that soaks up VEGF-A, the signal tumours use to grow new blood vessels. Approved in 2004, it partners chemotherapy in colorectal, ovarian, cervical, lung, kidney and liver cancer and glioblastoma, and adds to trifluridine/tipiracil in late-line bowel cancer; hypertension, protein in the urine and bleeding are its characteristic side effects.
A blood-vessel-blocking antibody that shrinks glioblastoma on scans and reduces swelling, but has never been shown to help patients live longer.
A pill that blocks both blood-vessel growth and the MET escape pathway, used in kidney, liver, thyroid and, since 2025, neuroendocrine cancers.
A Chinese immunotherapy-plus-anti-angiogenic pill combination that clearly beat sorafenib in liver cancer, yet remains unapproved in the US after three manufacturing-related rejections.
Donafenib is a Chinese redesign of sorafenib that lived longer than the original in a head-to-head liver cancer trial and is approved in China as a first-line option.
A Chinese-discovered pill that blocks the blood-vessel receptors, approved in 2023 for bowel cancer after all standard treatments.
An oral anti-angiogenic pill that matched sorafenib in liver cancer with higher response rates, and partners with pembrolizumab in kidney and endometrial cancer.
Nintedanib is a triple angiokinase inhibitor pill (VEGFR, FGFR, PDGFR) approved for pulmonary fibrosis and, in the EU, for second-line lung adenocarcinoma with docetaxel. In mesothelioma the phase 2 part of LUME-Meso suggested slower progression in epithelioid disease, but the phase 3 part showed none, a much-cited warning about small randomised phase 2 signals.
Pazopanib is the only multi-kinase inhibitor approved for soft-tissue sarcoma (excluding fat-derived tumours), used after chemotherapy fails.
An antibody that blocks the VEGF receptor, approved in liver cancer only for patients with a high AFP blood level, the first biomarker-selected HCC drug.
A sorafenib successor that became the first second-line drug proven to prolong life in liver cancer (2017).
Apatinib, sold as rivoceranib outside China, was the first pill of its kind approved for stomach cancer and is now the partner of camrelizumab in first-line liver cancer.
The first drug ever to extend life in advanced liver cancer (2007), now mostly a comparator arm that newer combinations are measured against.
Sunitinib is an anti-angiogenic pill approved for pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours, kidney cancer and GIST.
An oral drug aimed at the tissue around the tumour rather than the cancer cells. It held the cancer back on scans and, if anything, shortened life.
Thalidomide is the drug behind the 1960s birth-defect tragedy, rehabilitated as the first immunomodulatory myeloma drug and the parent of lenalidomide and pomalidomide.
Tivozanib is a VEGF-receptor pill that hits VEGFR1 to 3 with little off-target kinase activity, so it is better tolerated than other anti-angiogenic pills, though hypertension and fatigue remain common. It is approved for kidney cancer after two or more prior treatments, and its TiNivo-2 trial showed that restarting immunotherapy after failure adds nothing.
Ziv-aflibercept (Zaltrap) is a decoy receptor that soaks up the blood-vessel growth signal VEGF. It is added to the FOLFIRI chemotherapy combination for bowel cancer that has spread and progressed after oxaliplatin.
For the first time a new drug has beaten pembrolizumab, the global first-line standard, in a randomised lung cancer trial, and it did so by combining checkpoint blockade with anti-angiogenesis in one molecule. For patients outside China nothing changes yet: the drug is not approved in the West, the trial was single-country, and survival benefit has not been shown. If confirmed in the global HARMONi-3 and HARMONi-7 trials, PD-1 x VEGF bispecifics could replace PD-1 antibodies as the immunotherapy backbone.
A third refractory-line option, and the clearest example in colorectal cancer of a drug developed and approved in China going on to a global registration trial.
Trifluridine-tipiracil with bevacizumab is the refractory-line standard, and a reminder that combining two drugs already on the shelf can beat anything new in the same line.
Patients with newly diagnosed advanced clear-cell kidney cancer should receive an immunotherapy-based combination; lenvatinib plus pembrolizumab gives the highest response rate and longest PFS of the available options, at the cost of more side effects requiring dose adjustment. Sunitinib alone is no longer an appropriate standard. Choosing among the combinations depends on risk group, symptoms, comorbidity and the value placed on treatment-free survival, which favours nivolumab plus ipilimumab in intermediate and poor risk.
Patients with advanced liver cancer and good liver function should be offered atezolizumab plus bevacizumab (or durvalumab plus tremelimumab) rather than sorafenib as first treatment; median survival is now around 19 months and about a quarter of patients respond. Endoscopy to treat varices before starting bevacizumab is essential because of bleeding risk. Patients with poorer liver function (Child-Pugh B) or autoimmune disease or transplants were not studied.
Women with newly diagnosed advanced ovarian cancer should have their tumour tested for BRCA mutations and homologous recombination deficiency, because those who are HRD-positive gain years of additional disease control and better survival from adding olaparib to bevacizumab maintenance. Those who are HRD-negative gain nothing from olaparib in this combination and should not be exposed to its toxicity and cost. HRD testing has become a routine part of ovarian cancer care as a result.
The negative counterweight to FIRE-3. The two trials are reconciled only by primary tumour side, which is why the sidedness analysis rather than either trial is what guidelines now cite.
The triplet is the option for fit patients who need a response, particularly in BRAF-mutant and right-sided disease where the EGFR antibody route is closed; it also quantified how much worse BRAF-mutant disease was before BEACON and BREAKWATER.
Query for this technology: (TITLE:"anti-angiogenic" OR ABSTRACT:"anti-angiogenic" OR TITLE:"antiangiogenic" OR ABSTRACT:"antiangiogenic" OR TITLE:"VEGF inhibitor" OR ABSTRACT:"VEGF inhibitor" OR TITLE:"bevacizumab" OR ABSTRACT:"bevacizumab") AND (cancer OR tumor OR tumour OR oncology OR carcinoma OR lymphoma OR leukemia OR leukaemia OR myeloma OR sarcoma OR melanoma OR glioma). Results are unfiltered search hits about Anti-angiogenic therapy, not a curated reading list.
Shares A Study of BMS-986490 With or Without Bevacizumab in Advanced Solid Tumors, Sacituzumab Govitecan and Bevacizumab for NSCLC Brain Metastases, Study of Bevacizumab in Combination With Chemoimmunotherapy and Atezolizumab in Patients With Extensive Stage Small Cell Lung Cancer and Liver Metastases, A Prospective Pivotal Study to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of Avastin® Bevacizumab (BEV) With or Without Microbubble-mediated Focused Ultrasound (FUS-MB) Using NaviFUS System in Recurrent Glioblastoma Multiforme Patients.
Shares A Study of IBR854 Combined With Pazopanib Versus Pazopanib in Advanced Renal Cell Carcinoma, A Phase 2 Study of Luvometinib Combined With Anlotinib in KRAS-mutated NSCLC, A Study of Cabozantinib Compared With Placebo in Subjects With Radioiodine-refractory Differentiated Thyroid Cancer Who Have Progressed After Prior Va, A Study of Continued Treatment With Regorafenib in Participants With Solid Tumors Who Have Participated in Other Bayer Studies.
Shares A Study of Nofazinlimab (CS1003) in Subjects With Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma, CELESTIAL, Phase IIb Study of AST-3424 in Patients With AKR1C3-high Expressing Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma, RESORCE.
Shares Anlotinib Plus Immune Checkpoint Inhibitors for Lung Cancer, Sacituzumab Govitecan and Bevacizumab for NSCLC Brain Metastases, Study of Bevacizumab in Combination With Chemoimmunotherapy and Atezolizumab in Patients With Extensive Stage Small Cell Lung Cancer and Liver Metastases, A Study of Chidamide Combined With Ivonescimab in the Treatment of Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) With Acquired Resistance to Immunotherapy and Hig.
Shares Fruquintinib In Patients With Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Refractory to Standard Chemotherapies in South Korea Patients (FIRST-K), A Phase II Clinical Study of Aipalolitovorelizumab (QL1706) Combined With Fruquintinib in the Treatment of Immunodominant pMMR/MSS Metastatic Colorectal Cancer, A Prospective, Open-label, Single-arm Phase II Clinical Study of Fruquintinib Combined With S-1 for the Treatment of Metastatic Colorectal Cancer., Efficacy And Safety Of Hydroxychloroquine Combined With Methotrexate, Capecitabine And Bevacizumab Vs. Regorafenib In Participants With Refractory Metastatic Co.
Shares FOLFIRI and Bevacizumab With or Without Pelareorep for Second-Line Treatment of Metastatic RAS-Mutated, Microsatellite-Stable Colorectal Cancer, RAISE, A Phase II Study of AMT-676 Combination Therapies in Advanced Colorectal Cancer, A Study of Fruquintinib Plus FOLFIRI as Second-Line Treatment for Participants With Metastatic Colorectal Cancer (FRUITFUL).
Shares A Study of Chidamide Combined With Ivonescimab in the Treatment of Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) With Acquired Resistance to Immunotherapy and Hig, A Study to Test DSP107 in Combination With Atezolizumab in Comparison With Fruquintinib as a New Treatment for Colorectal Cancer., Paclitaxel Polymeric Micelles Plus Ivonescimab in Recurrent or Refractory SCLC, A Single Center, Single Arm Clinical Study on the Treatment of Advanced Non-small Cell Lung Cancer With Positive EGFR Sensitive Mutations and Failed EGFR TKIs W.
Shares Fruquintinib In Patients With Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Refractory to Standard Chemotherapies in South Korea Patients (FIRST-K), A Phase II Clinical Study of Aipalolitovorelizumab (QL1706) Combined With Fruquintinib in the Treatment of Immunodominant pMMR/MSS Metastatic Colorectal Cancer, A Prospective, Open-label, Single-arm Phase II Clinical Study of Fruquintinib Combined With S-1 for the Treatment of Metastatic Colorectal Cancer., Efficacy And Safety Of Hydroxychloroquine Combined With Methotrexate, Capecitabine And Bevacizumab Vs. Regorafenib In Participants With Refractory Metastatic Co.