It is named after Sir Hans Heysen, a prominent South Australian landscape artist.

That election saw the seat turn marginal against Labor for the first time ever; the Liberals were cut down to 53 percent of the two-party vote.

Greens candidate Lynton Vonow came within a few percent of winning the overlapping federal seat of Mayo at the 2008 by-election.

The 2018 election saw Nick Xenophon's SA-BEST receive 48.2 percent of the two-candidate preferred vote in Heysen which was the closest they came to winning a lower house seat.

At the 2022 state election, the Liberals fell to only 51 percent of the two-party vote amid their statewide collapse, only the second time the seat had been marginal against Labor.