Nucleotide excision repair (NER) is an important DNA repair mechanism required for cellular resistance against UV light and toxic chemicals such as those found in tobacco smoke. In living cells, NER efficiently detects and removes DNA lesions within the large nuclear macromolecular complex called chromatin. The condensed nature of chromatin inhibits many DNA metabolizing activities, including NER. In order to promote efficient repair, detection of a lesion not only has to activate the NER pathway but also chromatin remodeling. In general, such remodeling is thought on the one hand to precede NER, thus allowing repair proteins to efficiently access DNA. On the other hand, after completion of the repair, the chromatin must be returned to its previous undamaged state. Chromatin remodeling can refer to three separate but interconnected processes, histone post-translational modifications, insertion of histone variants and histone displacement (including nucleosome sliding). Here we review current knowledge, and speculate about current unknowns, regarding those chromatin remodeling activities that physically displace histones before, during and after NER.