The club was founded on 24 May 1914 by a group of high school students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.

[citation needed] In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits.

Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968.

In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs.

In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (joined by Bayern Munich in 2020) to have scored five or more goals in one match against the Spanish giants in official UEFA competitions.

Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.

[9] Levski's UEFA Cup run and the consequent participation in the Champions League group stage were considered the club's greatest European successes in the 21st century, hence the period of their occurrence (2005–2007) was informally called the Blue Tale.

During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League.

This caused an upset with the fans and players,[citation needed] and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league.

Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director.

Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik.

Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule.

Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia.

Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break.

Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization.

[24] Under his governance, Levski signed players like Gabriel Obertan and Jordi Gómez, as well as coach Delio Rossi, in an attempt to return the club's glory.

[28] He attempted to stabilize Levski's financial situation by immediately covering the most urgent obligations and selling or releasing the players with the highest wages, investing around 25 million BGN in total throughout his tenure.

[30] The club being left with no financing whatsoever and in a full-scale financial crisis,[31] sparkled an unprecedented support campaign amongst the fans, who engaged in various donation initiatives, raising 2.6 million BGN in the span of five months.

[33] Bozhkov's confession was somewhat of a confirmation of the insinuation that the reason behind Levski's financial problems and occasional ownership changes was Borisov's idea of using the club as an instrument for political influence.

Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years.

Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.

With his arrival, Stoilov released three players – Simeon Slavchev, Valeri Bojinov and Hristofor Hubchev, and signed José Córdoba from Etar and Dimitar Kostadinov from Septemvri Sofia.

On 15 May 2022, Levski won the Bulgarian Cup by defeating its biggest rivals CSKA 1–0 in the final, thus ending the club's longest ever trophyless period (13 years).

[37] However, Levski crashed out of the tournament in the third qualifying round after an upsetting home defeat on penalties at the hands of Maltese side Ħamrun Spartans.

In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia".

However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue.

[43] Initially, the club did not possess a field of its own and training was held on an empty space called The Hillock (Могилката/Mogilkata), where the National Palace of Culture was built later.

In 1961, after districting, the team moved to Suhata Reka neighborhood, where a new stadium was built by 1963, which was later renamed in 1990 in honour of former Levski player Georgi Asparuhov.

[45][46] According to a study performed for UEFA, Levski is the most popular Bulgarian club and share the sixth position in Europe with Juventus, by percentage of support in its own country (31%).

Notable academy graduates are Georgi Asparuhov, Nasko Sirakov, Bozhidar Iskrenov, Bozhin Laskov, Georgi Sokolov, Asen Peshev, Borislav Mihaylov, Emil Spasov, Nikolay Iliev, Hristo Yovov, Dimitar Ivankov, Hristo Iliev, Aleksandar Kostov, Tsvetan Veselinov, Zdravko Zdravkov, Voyn Voynov, Nikolay Mihaylov and many others.