The municipality was created in 1974 when Bergsjö, Gnarp, Hassela and Harmånger were amalgamated.

The name chosen for the new municipality was taken from a corresponding ecclesiastical entity, Nordanstigs kontrakt, which got this name in 1916 on the initiative of Nathan Söderblom, the archbishop of Uppsala.

Olympic gold medalist in slalom from 2018 PyongChang, André Myhrer, is born in Bergsjö, Nordanstig municipality.

This is a demographic table based on Nordanstig Municipality's electoral districts in the 2022 Swedish general election sourced from SVT's election platform, in turn taken from SCB official statistics.

Largest private employers were (2004):[4] Nordanstig has one sister city: