It contains many of Budapest's significant buildings along its length, including the famed Dohány Street Synagogue at its western end.
It was first named after the popular and well-known snuff and tobacco maker Anton Prinder, who originally worked in house 211 on Tabakmacher Gasse (Tobacco Maker Street), but then moved after 1804 into the section between Síp utca and Károly kórüt, often called the Seiten Landstrasse (in German, "Side Highway").
Since Dohány utca was created, it has served as a significant transport route, the main carriageway connecting the city of Pest with the eastern parts of the country, the relief section of the Hatvani (today Rákóczi) út.
During the second half of the nineteenth century, a large number of Jews moved here, and in 1859 the first significant synagogue of Pest Jewry was inaugurated at the beginning of the street, now the Dohány Street Synagogue.
At the end of the Second World War, the border of the Pest ghetto was located here.