With slightly under five million entries and exits in 2011, Chalk Farm is one of the busiest stations on the Edgware branch of the Northern line.

The station was opened on 22 June 1907 by the Charing Cross, Euston & Hampstead Railway (CCE&HR).

Trains originally operated between Golders Green and Charing Cross, with extensions to Edgware and Kennington in 1923–24 and 1926, respectively.

With the subsequent extension of the City and South London Railway (C&SLR) to Camden Town in 1924, the CCE&HR and C&SLR were joined, allowing through running on the Bank branch and service as far south as Clapham Common, extending to Morden in 1926.

London ska/pop band Madness posed outside of Chalk Farm tube station for the covers of their no.