Extra-solar planets around solar-type stars

The first extra-solar planet orbiting a solar-type star was discovered 6 years ago, based on precise radial-velocity measurements. Today, more than 60 planetary candidates are known and their number is growing regularly. They present a wide variety of characteristics. Massive candidates with small orbital separations or large eccentricities were generally unexpected. The questions set by these peculiarities and the proposed answers will be discussed, as well as the first statistical trends pointed out from the sample gathered so far: planet versus binary mass and orbital-element distributions or metallicity content of stars hosting planets. The latters are in average more metal rich than common dwarfs of the solar neighbourhood. Environmental versus contamination effects are discussed in the light of new results in the field. Finally, future promising techniques for exoplanet detection are briefly discussed as well.