The boulevard is 1040 metres long, and approximately 70 metres wide, it starts from the Place d'Italie and extends to Rue de la Santé, on the edge of the 14th arrondissement, where it becomes the Boulevard Saint-Jacques.

The boulevard is named after the French thinker and socialist revolutionary Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805–1881).

The boulevard occupies the site of the ancient Wall of the Farmers-General.

Originally, the roadways ran alongside the wall, which was knocked down in the 1860s.

Their former names were : "In this house lived from his release from prison in 1878 until his death on 1 January 1881 Great revolutionary AUGUSTE BLANQUI.40 years of prison never dented his loyalty to the working class cause.'