In 1915 Kilburn Park tube station was opened a little to the south on the Bakerloo Line extension from Paddington, drawing its passengers from a similar catchment area to Kilburn High Road station and providing a quicker connection with the West End.

The current footbridge and street-level buildings are not so much the result of modernisation but of three or four major fires which have occurred here since the early 1970s.

The new London Overground line names and colours were introduced across the London rail network in November 2024 The off-peak service on all days of the week in trains per hour is: The station is occasionally used as a reversing point on the London Underground network by out-of-service Bakerloo line trains when they cannot enter the LU platforms at Queens Park station due to planned engineering work or failures, and/or are prevented from reversing in the Up DC line platform there.

The fourth rail (bonded to the traction current return rail) continues towards Kilburn High Road to permit these movements, but the carrying of passengers to Kilburn High Road by LU tube trains is not permitted as the platform height is matched to National Rail trains (platforms on this line north of Queens Park station are positioned at a "transition" height which is higher than that for normal LU platforms and lower than NR platforms).

Kilburn High Road appears on non-public internal London Underground (LU) maps and documents for this purpose.