This book discusses various aspects of real-world applications of optimization algorithms, presenting insights from the 5th International Conference on Harmony Search, Soft Computing and Applications, held at Kunming, China on July 20-22, 2019. The book focuses on the recent advances in soft computing techniques such as harmony search, PSO and DE and their application to solve engineering problems. Presenting research on various real-world engineering problems concerning crowd evacuation strategies, adaptive learning systems, economic impact analysis, cyber-attack detection, urban drainage systems, water management models, feature selection and inventory systems, it is a valuable resource for researchers wanting a state-of-the-art overview of the latest advances in soft computing and related areas.