Overwhelmingly the Ovimbundu follow Christianity, mainly the Igreja Evangélica Congregacional de Angola (IECA), founded by American missionaries, and the Catholic Church.

The origins of the Ovimbundu are Bantu populations who drifted in from the North, over the last millennium, and formed local/regional groups which slowly became political units and foci of social identity: M'Balundu, Sele, Wambo, Bieno and others.

They developed a sophisticated agriculture, completed by the breeding of small animals (chicken, goats, swine) as well as of a modicum of cows bought from the farmer-herders to the South (Nyaneka-Nkhumbi, Ovambo).

Several of the small kingdoms saw their advantage in organising an intense caravan trade between Benguela and peoples of the East, in particular the Chokwe, the Luvale and the Mbunda,[1] from whom they obtained wax, rubber, honey and ivory.

[b] During the Civil War the two major cities located in Umbundu territory, Huambo and Kuito, were to a large extent destroyed by the MPLA and UNITA respectively, as were a considerable number of villages and much infrastructure (roads, railways, bridges etc.).