Thermoluminescence (TL) has traditionally been used to estimate the depth of trapping centers in luminescence materials and explain the isothermal decay in the case of synthetic dosimeters and natural materials used in luminescence dating. Nevertheless, new fields of application of TL and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) materials, namely particle temperature sensing and thermochronometry, motivate a need for accurate models for the luminescence processes and estimation of the trapping parameters, in particular activation energy and frequency factor. Although calibration of the TL materials may be possible and recommended in some applications, using for example, microheaters, laser heating or pyroprobes, the procedures can be complicated and time consuming. With TL, however, appropriate models with parameters obtained in laboratory conditions can in principle be used to predict the temperature and time dependence of the stimulation processes in the microsecond to the second timescales (in the case of particle temperature sensing), and in the tens of thousands years (in the case of thermochronometry). In this paper we present the fundamentals of temperature sensing using TL, tracing parallels between the applications in thermochronometry and in particle temperature sensing, and review the main challenges, both fundamental and practical, for the advancement of the technique. Fundamental challenges are the very wide timescales involved in these applications, the need for better TL models, and the inherent time-temperature ambiguity in the Arrhenius equation, in addition to other practical problems. Possible solutions to these challenges and future research directions are discussed.