First organised by the Association de Promotion des Événements Lillois in 1986, the race began as a marathon event before switching to the shorter distance in 1996.

[1] The course of the race begins in the Boulevard de la Liberté and finishes at the front of Lille's city hall on Rue de Paris.

Bruno Leger was the men's winner with a time of 1:02:31 while Christine Mallo took the women's title in 1:12:05.

[3] The half marathon race has delivered some fast winning times – the 2009 race saw the top three men run under an hour and Mary Keitany ran the seventh quickest run ever to become the women's race winner.

[5] In addition to the half and full marathon, the Lille Half Marathon also hosted an elite 5K run and 10K run starting in 2023.