A growing number of pregnant women are using herbal medicine during labor. The aim of this study is to provide investigate the effect of saffron on labor and childbirth.

Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane Library, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, EMBASE, Google Scholar, and, Iranian databases such as SID, magiran, and Iranmedex were manually searched. The search strategy followed PRISMA guideline.

There was a significant reduction in the anxiety levels (CI:-0.96- -0.004, p:0.048) and the duration of the first and second stages of the labor (CI:-0.80- -3.84, p< 0.001), (CI:-0.94- -0.13, p:0.01), a higher bishop score (CI:0.28-1.07, p:0.001) in women who consumed saffron. Other than nausea no significant adverse effect was reported.

Although saffron consumption can have a positive effect on bishop score, labor anxiety, and duration of first and second stages of labor, further studies with the purified components of saffron are needed.