Bacterial cellulose (BC) is an important biological material with diverse applications across various sectors. However, its industrialization and large-scale commercialization encounter significant obstacles, primarily due to high fermentation costs and low productivity. To tackle the challenges in BC production, extensive research has explored the use of low-cost feedstocks and large amounts of waste biomass by-products from various sources. Agricultural, food processing, brewing, textile, and pulp and paper industry wastes are promising alternative ingredients for fermentation. This chapter discusses the use of agricultural and industrial wastes, highlighting the common pretreatment methods employed to process these raw materials. It categorizes media sources into sugar-rich, starch-based, cellulosic and lignocellulosic, and miscellaneous wastes. This chapter further introduces innovative strategies to enhance waste utilization for BC production, aiming to reduce production costs and enable wider industrial applications. The use of waste biomass as culture media not only has the potential to diminish BC production costs but also to promote the recycling of waste resources and mitigate environmental pollution and associated treatment expenses. Nevertheless, the majority of research is limited to laboratory environments, with a notable lack of large-scale production instances. The transition to large-scale BC production also requires the implementation of advanced reactors, optimization of fermentation processes, and maintenance of stable microbial strains. Therefore, realizing BC’s full potential as a sustainable, cost-effective material requires collaborative efforts between academia and industry to overcome the current limitations and advance toward environmentally sustainable, commercially viable production.