[6] The first edition of El Nacional circulated on 3 August 1943, founded by Miguel Otero Silva in Caracas, with innovations such as the replacement of the editorial by the mancheta, the use of notorious headlines with large graphics and the classification of the entire newspaper by thematic areas.

The digital edition of El Nacional was inaugurated in 1996, characterized by including information different from that presented in the printed format of the newspaper.

El Nacional launched on the market a sensationalist-yellowish newspaper on 14 October 1996 with the intention to reach the popular strata, without obtaining good results.

[11] On 13 August 2010, El Nacional printed a photograph of corpses lying on stretchers and on the floor of the Caracas morgue [es] to denounce the situation of crime in the country.

As a result, police officers searched the newspaper headquarters and a court forbid El Nacional, along with Tal Cual, to publish any violent images or information.

Venezuela and Todo en domingo (the latter of which is delivered together with the Sunday edition of the newspaper), a book publishing press and has two websites: Eme de mujer and ovaciondeportes.com.

Arturo Úslar Pietri, one of the most important intellectuals of the country, wrote for more than fifty years in an opinion column in the newspaper.

[citation needed] El Nacional would become quite critical of the second Carlos Andrés Pérez administration, joining opponents such as the Attorney General Ramón Escovar Salom and journalist José Vicente Rangel, culminating in his impeachment in 1993.

On the following day editorial, the newspaper reacted positively to the political crisis leading up to the coup saying that "this battle is coming to an end".

[23] In May 2021, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice ruled that El Nacional must pay 237,000 petros, or about $13,369,170 at the time of the decision, to Cabello and that the newspaper's headquarters would be seized to compensate him.