The development of probes for Hg2+ ion has been an active area of research in recent years because of the ill effects of this ion on the human health and environment. Hence the probe that needs to be developed should be sensitive as well as biologically compatible. This review mainly focuses to provide a comprehensive and comparative view of advances reported over the past ten years of literature, including our own contributions, in the design and application of the carbohydrate-based conjugates as fluorescent sensors for mercury. Therefore, this review covers aspects, such as, Hg2+ ion recognition, sensing and complexation by carbohydrate conjugates addressed using different spectral techniques and their critical analysis in a comparative manner.