Rosemary and sage are composed of bioactive molecules in high demand by the food, pharmaceutical, and cosmetic industries to produce value-added products. After the industrial extraction of essential oils, the raw material still has nonvolatile compounds interesting for other commercial products. The nonvolatile fraction comprises terpenes and phenolic acids (rosmarinic acid, carnosic acid, and derivatives), which are economically valuable. Modern extraction techniques integrated with other processes within the biorefinery are highly needed to obtain well-evaluated products from these plant matrices. The chemical and biological features of such compounds from rosemary and sage were reviewed and deeply discussed. Recovery technologies, including the influence of operational parameters on extract yield and concentration, were addressed in the past 20 years of available literature. Critical issues for modern production systems, such as applying emerging solvents and developing platforms for zero-waste biorefineries, were also highlighted. The bioactive compounds of rosemary and sage stand out for their specific biological properties. This feature allows obtaining well-defined extracts through modern and emerging extraction technologies, enabling higher specificity for industrial applications. Both raw materials are attractive for biorefineries with current production concepts. However, complete studies addressing the biorefinery of these herbs from a technical, scalable, economic, and environmental point of view are still needed. •Rosemary and sage are promising to be used in biorefinery towards the zero-waste concept.•Non-volatile fraction from rosemary and sage display attractive biological properties.•Phenolic acids and diterpenes rich extract plays target roles as a functional food ingredient.•Modern techniques can modulate the extraction to produce single well-defined extracts.•New process platforms for both matrices are still needed, targeting lab-to-industry scales.