The endosomal system is a major membrane-sorting apparatus. New evidence reveals that novel coat proteins assist specific sorting steps and docking factors ensure the vectorial nature of trafficking in the endosomal compartment. There is also good evidence for ubiquitin regulating passage of certain proteins into multivesicular late endosomes, which mature by accumulating invaginated membrane. Lipids play a central role in this involution process, as do the class E vacuolar protein-sorting proteins.