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Air pollution is currently considered a major public health problem responsible for increasing morbidity and mortality. Polluted air contributes to the global burden of respiratory and allergic diseases, including asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, pneumonia and possibly tuberculosis. Deteriorated air quality is closely linked to the amount of anthropogenic emissions of pollutants into the atmosphere. These have different origins – from industrial and energy sources, through emissions from transport to small sources from local household heating. Air pollution is a heterogeneous mixture of compounds that includes ozone, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, liquids, volatile organic compounds, heavy metals and solid particles. In this paper, we monitored the development of air pollution by selected emissions in the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic. We obtained data from the OECD database for the years 2000–2018. We monitored particulate matter (PM2.5, PM10), NMVOC (non-methan volatile organic compounds), NOX (nitrogen oxides), SOX (sulphur oxides) and CO (carbon monoxide). We also compared total emissions per country in terms of per capita. In the monitored period, we found an overall declining trend in the production of emissions of particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, sulphur oxides, carbon monoxide and non-methane volatile organic compounds in the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]