The area of the district is 13,200 square kilometers (5,100 sq mi).

[2] Its administrative center is the urban locality (an urban-type settlement) of Chernyshevsk.

[3] The district was established on January 4, 1926[1] by merging Chernyshevskaya, Kalininskaya, and Zyulzinskaya Volosts of Nerchinsky Uyezd.

[2] It was abolished and split between Mogochinsky, Nerchinsky, and Shilkinsky Districts in February 1963, but reinstated in modern borders in January 1965.

[2] In 2010, a Konservat-Lagerstätte was discovered in the district, in the locality of Kulinda, part of the Ukureyskaya Formation.