The society has also given its name "CMS" to a number of daughter organisations around the world, including Australia and New Zealand, which have now become independent.

The original proposal for the mission came from Charles Grant and George Udny of the East India Company and David Brown, of Calcutta, who sent a proposal in 1787 to William Wilberforce, then a young member of parliament, and Charles Simeon, a young clergyman at Cambridge University.

[2] Their number included Charles Simeon, Basil Woodd,[4][6] Henry Thornton, Thomas Babington[7] and William Wilberforce.

Dr. Henry Graham was the first CMS Medical missionary when he was sent to Sierra Leone and shifted the focus from care of the mission staff to assistance for local people.

From 1816, "containing the principal transactions of the various institutions for propagating the gospel with the proceedings at large of the Church Missionary Society".

[55] The training center was called "The Willows", under the Mildmay Trustees, until having been bought by the Church Missionary Society in 1891.

[58] During the early 20th century, the society's theology moved in a more liberal direction under the leadership of Eugene Stock.

[59] There was considerable debate over the possible introduction of a doctrinal test for missionaries, which advocates claimed would restore the society's original evangelical theology.

Notable general secretaries of the society later in the 20th century were Max Warren and John Vernon Taylor.

The first woman president of the CMS, Diana Reader Harris (serving 1969–1982), was instrumental in persuading the society to back the 1980 Brandt Report on bridging the North-South divide.

In 2015–16, Church Mission Society had a budget of £6.8 million, drawn primarily from donations by individuals and parishes, supplemented by historic investments.