Lithography is a fundamental process in semiconductor chip manufacturing, patterning the chip design onto the photoresist coated wafer substrate before it is further processed for creating the device architectures. At one end, cutting EUV lithography is shaping the 3-5nm devices with masks and advanced OPC (optical proximity correction algorithms), and at the other end, newer maskless lithography technologies are shaping patterning at 2micron (predicted to touch 500nm) for other emerging applications in micro-electronics with new commercial propositions and actualization TAT. This paper gives a comparative overview of these patterning technologies and their potent applications in the semiconductor industry.