The paper covers the historical development institute of the penal order and its implementation in the legislation. At first there is explained in detail what abbreviated procedure is, to which it belongs previously mentioned penal order, and the advantages of a generally abbreviated procedure are highlighted and the types of the same are listed. Then, the work follows the development of the institute of criminal order from the beginning, changes that have occured with each individual novelty of the Criminal Procedure Code, the expansion of the areas in which it is applied, follos the factors that have changed over the years, and have contributed to improving the application of the institute. The paper further explains what is actually considered under the institute of penal order and how it contributes to relieving the judical system. The role and regulation of the penal order in the positive croatian legislation is stated, and for the comparison, the procedure of issuing the same in other countries, more precisely in Germany, Switzerland, Italy and Bosnia and Herzegovina has been elaborated. The main part states the general preconditions for issuing a penal order, the procedure for its application, and legal remedies against it. The judical control of the indictment containing the request for the issuance of a penal order was explained. In a certain part, the role of the state attorney`s office in the procedure for issuing penal order is mentioned, and at the same time the role of the court that has the last word in the procedure is emphasized. At the end of the paper, statistical data are highlighted that gives a closer look at the application of the institute of penal order in court practice. Keywords: penalty