The nature of a subjective right causes the possibility of a criminal proceedings participant willingly, based on own interests and wishes, both to exercise the right exactly and waive it and not to use the provided procedural possibilities. Within the criminal proceedings, the waiver of the right institute is new, underdeveloped. There is practically no understanding of its subject matter and the extent of its exercise at the level of doctrine and jurisprudence as opposed to the foreign experience and civil legal regulation, which causes definite scientific interest in this topic. The paper carries out the look-back analysis of the definition of the nature of the waiver of the subjective right in Russian legal doctrine. This institute is relatively new and little researched in the Russian doctrine, which determines a particular scientific interest in the study of this issue. The paper provides the authors’ description of the waiver of the subjective right. In respect to the Russian criminal procedural legislation, the authors highlight the necessity to distinguish between the refusal of a right and the refusal to exercise a right by the participants in the criminal procedural activity; analyze the differentiated approach of the legislator on this issue. Based on the theoretical and legal analysis, the authors define that the waiver of the subjective right has definite essential features, forms, and ways of implementation, as well as specify the criteria for its admissibility. The paper proves the conclusion that the waiver of the right within the criminal process is possible under such conditions, as the direct willingness of a subject of criminal law relations to waive a right; the awareness of the existence of a particular procedural right and the consequences of such refusal; the form of a waiver showing its voluntary nature by implementing the intended freedom of choice. The authors expressed the proposals aimed at the improvement of norms of current criminal procedural legislation.