With acceleration of such emerging global problems as climate change, overpopulation, loss of biodiversity, deforestation, soil erosion, air, water and soil pollution modern economy is seeking for new and sustainable paradigm on how to operate. A promising concept which can have a positive impact on mitigation of global issues is circular economy. Concept is wide and seems to be philosophical in its essence. Therefore, the paper breaks down the concept of circular economy. The objective of the study is to identify characteristic elements of circular economy. Qualitative content analysis of 35 articles published from 2016 to 2019 and indexed in SCOPUS was used to identify the key elements of circular economy. The results show that key elements of circular economy are ‘4R+7R’ (24,6%), waste (11,8%), closed-loops (10,8%), design (10,6%), business models (9,3%), systems thinking (6,0%), life cycle thinking (6,0%), resource efficiency (5,8%), consumption (4,8%), value preservation (3,0%), sharing (2,5%), renewable energy (2,0%), behaviour (1,5%) and industrial symbiosis (1,3%). This research indicating specific elements of circular economy reflect the concept as wide tool with various specific strategies which has a great potential in contributing to global issue solving.