Born in Stara Zagora, Filov was partly educated in Imperial Germany at Leipzig, Freiburg, and Würzburg.

After the death of Boris in August 1943, Filov became a member of the Regency Council established because the new tsar, Simeon II, was underage.

In November, 1940, the government of Bogdan Filov proposed the Law for Protection of the Nation; Parliament voted its approval on December 24, 1940.

In accordance with a governmental decision made in March 1943, Jews from the "newly annexed territories", who were not Bulgarian subjects, were deported by Bulgarian authorities to German extermination camps: in total, 11,343 Jews from then occupied northern Greece and Vardar Banovina were deported to German custody and later to the Treblinka killing centers; almost none survived.

Following the armistice with the Soviet Union whose forces had entered Bulgaria in 1944, a new Communist-dominated government was established and the Regency Council members were arrested.

Filov and ninety-two other public officials were sentenced to death by a "People's Tribunal" on the afternoon of 1 February 1945 and executed by firing squad that night in Sofia cemetery.