The region is home to a significant concentration of government services, social enterprise, and private sector companies, including the Canadian Coast Guard College, Cape Breton University, NSCC Marconi campus, and New Dawn Enterprises.

The rural areas of the municipality continue to host resource industries such as agriculture, fishing, mining, and forestry.

CBRM is host to many cultural landmarks and institutions such as the historic Savoy Theatre, the Celtic Colours International Festival, the Cape Breton Centre for Craft, the Highland Arts Theatre, and Holy Angels Arts & Cultural centre, currently undergoing a $12-million renovation.

[8] The Port of Sydney was projected to welcome a record 135,000 cruise ship visitors in 2017, a 67 percent increase on 2016.

[10] The glaciers began their retreat from the Maritimes approximately 13,500 years ago,[11] with final deglaciation, post-glacial rebound, and sea level fluctuation ending and leaving the New England-Maritimes region virtually ice free 11,000 years ago.

However, settlement seems likely to have occurred earlier,[12] following large game animals such as the caribou as they expanded into the land revealed by the retreating glaciers.

The record of continuous habitation through the paleo and archaic period over ten thousand years culminated in the development of the culture, traditions, and language of the First Nations people now known as the Mi'kmaq.

[13] The area known as Cape Breton Island has been a part of the territory of the Mi'kmaq nation of Mi'kma'ki.

It was captured again during the Seven Years' War which saw the inhabitants expelled and the fortress completely destroyed by British Army engineers in 1760.

By proclamation of October 17, 1763, after termination of the Seven Years' War, Île Royale was renamed Cape Breton Island and was formally annexed to Nova Scotia.

In response to a public outcry, the minority government of Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson announced J.R. Donald would head a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Cape Breton coal industry, with hearings held in 1965 and 1966.

DEVCO ceased to exist on December 31, 2009, with its remaining assets and staff turned over to Enterprise Cape Breton Corporation (ECBC), a federal government economic development initiative, in an attempt to diversify the CBRM economy.

Regional Council is responsible for all facets of the municipal government, including police, fire, library, transit, and water.

[21] Under former Mayor John Morgan, the council authorized several studies regarding fairness and equity, fighting for a larger share of the federal equalization funding from the province, including an ultimately unsuccessful legal challenge in 2004.

After a long struggle to recover from the disappearance of coal and steel industries and while continuing to suffer from high annual population loss the economy of Cape Breton is projected to achieve sustainable growth from 2017 to 2021.

[25] Cape Breton Island, of which CBRM is home to over three quarters of the population, has continued economic strength in its fishing and forestry primary sectors and in services (trade, transportation and warehousing, business and other support services), education, health care, and accommodation & food.

[33] As the province's second largest municipality, recent federal policy of increased infrastructure spending will provide added economic stimulus.

[25] The boundary of CBRM includes all of Cape Breton County except for the Eskasoni and Membertou First Nations.

[3] Within the regional municipality there are multiple census population centres (previously known as urban areas).

Novaporte is proposed to operate as an officially designated Canadian Foreign Trade Zone.

Handi-Trans paratransit is available for passengers whose disabilities restrict them from using Transit Cape Breton's regular bus service.

[52] The regional municipality is home to several institutions of higher learning: English language public schools in CBRM are operated by the Cape Breton – Victoria Regional Centre for Education on behalf of the provincial government's Department of Education.

This regional education office provides instruction for grades primary to 12 in CBRM as well as in neighbouring Victoria County.

French language public school education is administered throughout the province by the Conseil Scolaire Acadien Provincial.

The area is also known for its vibrant music scene, which includes celtic, singer-songwriter, and country artists, as well as underground alternative rock, metal, and punk bands who have played the local circuit since the mid to late 1990s.

The Holy Angels Arts & Cultural centre is currently undergoing a $12 million renovation.

In the late 1990s, after a divisive debate, the municipality expanded CBRPS coverage to also cover the rural area of CBRM.