The term Bhilai is derived from the Bhil tribe which originally inhabited this region and continues to dwell in the nearby forests until today.

The foundation of the modern city of Bhilai was laid in 1955 when the Indian government signed a historic agreement with the Soviet Union in Magnitogorsk to establish a steel plant near the village.

According to the Bureau of Indian Standards, the town falls under seismic zone 2, in a scale of 2 to 5 (in order of increasing value of vulnerability to earthquakes).

The inauguration of the first blast furnace of Bhilai Steel Plant was done by then president of India Dr. Rajendra Prasad, which was established with help from the Soviet Union in 1955.

Pig iron and billets are supplied to foundries and rolling mills located at Kumhari and other sites in central India.

[12] The city serves as an educational hub in the region, with a total of 59 universities and colleges, like Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bhilai, Chhattisgarh Swami Vivekanand Technical University, Bhilai Institute of Technology, Shri Shankaracharya Institute of Medical Sciences, Chandulal Chandrakar Memorial Government Medical College, Rungta College Bhilai, and Shri Shankaracharya Technical Campus, Dau Shri Vasudev Chandrakar Kamdhenu Vishwavidyalaya Durg, Hemchand Yadav Vishwavidyalaya.

The proposed Durg–Raipur–Arang Expressway will start from Durg and will pass near the outskirts of Bhilai till Arang, which after completion, will enhance connectivity and commute in the state.

The Durg Bus Station is a hub with buses plying to any place in and around Chhattisgarh as well as other parts of the country, with daily bus services operated by private and government buses to all cities within the state and outside the state, like Bhubaneswar, Nagpur, Jharsuguda, Varanasi, Prayagraj, Kolkata, Patna, Ranchi, Hyderabad, Jabalpur, Visakhapatnam, among others.