Founded on 22 September 1989 in Düsseldorf, West Germany, its mission is to "enable Paralympic athletes to achieve sporting excellence and inspire and excite the world".

Furthermore, the IPC aims to promote the Paralympic values and to create sport opportunities for all persons with a disability, from beginner to elite level.

They desired a democratic structure, to improve national and regional representation, which led to the foundation of the IPC as it is known today.

The most recent election for the Governing Board was held on 12 December 2021:[3] The IPC Athletes' Council Chairperson, Jitske Visser, and IPC Athletes' Council First Vice Chairperson, Josh Dueck, also have voting rights on the board.

[15] In addition, the IPC maintains an active Instagram among other social media channels to share updates.

[16] In June 2001, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) signed an agreement that would ensure that the staging of the Paralympic Games is automatically included in the bid for the Olympic Games.

[21][22] On 30 November 2016, to distinguish them from the Paralympic Games, the IPC adopted the new blanket branding World Para Sports, with the subcommittees rebranded accordingly.

[14] In December 2021 during its virtual General Assembly, the IPC voted on a mandate to transfer its international governance of Paralympic sports to independent bodies by 2026, either by transferring them to an existing governing body, or spinning off subcommittees as independent federations.

"[21][22] In July 2022, the IPC transferred governance of skiing, snowboard, and biathlon to the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) and International Biathlon Union (IBU) respectively,[23] and in June 2023 appointed the British Paralympic Association and UK Sport to assist in spinning off World Para Athletics and World Para Swimming as independent federations that would be based in Manchester.

This change was made upon the request of the sport's community, partly due to the word "sledge" having different meanings across languages.