It was founded in 2014 and provides lectures, discussions, workshops, film screenings and exhibitions focusing on neuroscience, evolutionary biology, physics, law, and philosophy at various venues in the city.

The festival day usually starts with a morning program that includes the meetings of the Master's Breakfast series at De Revolutionibus Books & Cafe at Bracka Street.

Additional points of the program are the concerts at Fourm Przestrzenie club and the nighttime film screenings in Kino Mikro.

Copernicus Festival is managed with the support of financial resources of the City of Kraków, the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of Poland, the Foundation for Polish Science and Krakowskie Biuro Festiwalowe.

Editions: Over the years the festival guests were, among others: Dominika Dudek, Adam Łomnicki, Łukasz Orbitowski, Jan Woleński, Krzysztof Zanussi (2014), Wojciech Bonowicz (since 2014), Jerzy Vetulani (2014–2016), George Ellis, Anna Wierzbicka, Katarzyna Chałasińska-Macukow, Andrzej Olechowski, Marek Krajewski, Fisz and Emade, Ewa Łętowska (2015), Julian Barbour, Semir Zeki, John Banville, Stefan Chwin, Marcin Rotkiewicz (2016),[4] Hanna and Antonio Damasio, Karen Wynn, Paul Bloom, Mark Miodownik, Krzysztof Meissner, Andrzej Zoll, Andrzej Białas (2017),[5][6] Robert H. Frank, Daniel Gilbert, Adam Zagajewski, Andrzej Jajszczyk (2018), Paul Davies, Charles Taylor, Daniel Everett (2019).