[1] At the 2016 federal election, the seat covered 130 km², extending from Clarence Gardens and Urrbrae in the north to Marino and part of Happy Valley in the south, including the suburbs of Belair, Blackwood, Brighton, Daw Park, Eden Hills, Marion, Mitcham, Seacliff, St Marys and Panorama.

[2] Before 1949 and the creation of the Division of Sturt, Boothby covered most of the southern and eastern suburbs of Adelaide.

The mostly rural seat of Barker was then considered a "hybrid urban-rural" seat, stretching from the southern tip of South Australia at least as far as Glenelg and the Holdfast Bay area, and at times even stretched as far as the western metropolitan suburbs of Keswick and Henley Beach.

There was only one substantial redistribution in the past few decades when Boothby absorbed parts of the abolished Division of Hawker before the 1993 election.

[3] Boothby's most prominent member was Steele Hall, who most notably served as Premier of South Australia from 1968 to 1970.

After leaving state politics, Hall served in the Senate before transferring to Boothby in a 1981 by-election.

At the 2010 election Labor's Annabel Digance came within 638 votes of ending the long Liberal run in the seat.

[10] Vinnies SA CEO Louise Miller-Frost was preselected by Labor in mid-2021 and won the seat at the 21 May 2022 Federal election with 4.66% swing.