Scholars have recently claimed that heritage values are not fixed, but culturally created and historically specific. This article will analyze this statement by looking at how the concept and perception of heritage values themselves have been transformed in the last two centuries. The consequences of these changes will be examined in terms of decisions regarding what constitutes heritage and what should be preserved, the institutions related to new values that have been established and how this has impacted on national legislation and international agreements. It will be argued that there has been a steady growth in the number of heritage value categories taken into account by experts and that this has been accompanied by a displacement in the centrality of some that were previously regarded as the only ones. The main values considered in the article will be historical, aesthetic, natural, anthropological, symbolic, social, and economic. In contrast to the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, recent decades have seen a shift in focus from the material to the immaterial or intangible aspects of heritage, and from historical to social and economic values. Today, it is difficult to find agreement among professionals on a valid typology of heritage values, as preferences for the sets of categories used for value assessment depend on the country and the experts’ professional background, as well as on the type of heritage and context. The latest shift is linked to a global emphasis on social inclusivity, cultural sustainability and significance. Although this article focuses mainly on Europe, and to a lesser extent on the United States, much of what it is explained can be applied to other areas of the world.