Chiayi Airport is envisioned as a gateway to the Alishan National Scenic Area, a popular tourist destination in Taiwan.

[3] Uni Air is the sole operator of scheduled flights to the airport.

Due to the growth in passenger numbers at the airport, a terminal building was built in 1977 and opened on 1 January 1978.

TransAsia Airways, Far Eastern Air Transport and Formosa Airlines all launched flights at Chiayi Airport between 1994 and 1996.

This was followed by the successive withdrawals of Far Eastern Air Transport and TransAsia Airways in 2001 and 2002 respectively due to poor load factors caused by a slowing local economy.

[9] This forced Uni Air to cancel its twice-daily flights between Taipei and Chiayi in August 2015.