Despite being founded in 1936, the Peruvian Segunda Division did not have its first season up until 1943, where Atlético Telmo Carbajo of Callao won the tournament.

For decades after it was first formed in 1943, only clubs from the Department of Lima participated in the annual tournament where the winner gets promoted to the Copa Perú.

From 1998 it was established that the champion of this tournament would play a revalidation match with the team that finished second to last in the decentralized championship of the same year.

In 2002, following the Peruvian Football Federation's policy of increasing the number of teams in the first division, the champion of this tournament was immediately promoted.

In 2004 and 2005 the format changed, establishing that the champion and runner-up of the second division would be integrated into Region 4 of the Copa Perú.

As a result, the Copa Peru was moved down to the third tier, where is currently stands.It was only in 2006 that it was decided to decentralize this tournament (until then reserved for teams from the Department of Lima and the Constitutional Province of Callao), the championship began to be played with teams from different departments of Peru that obtained the category through a contest called by the Peruvian Football Federation or by relegation from the first division.

The lowest ranked team of each group gets relegated to the newly created Peruvian Tercera División.

[1] The Peruvian Second Division is sponsored by Movistar's Gol Perú, which has exclusive broadcasting rights.

Several stadiums used in the second division have artificial grass installed for the so-called massification of sport.

[3] Most stadiums in Peru are owned by the IPD (Instituto Peruano del Deporte), which is the state group responsible for supporting the use of artificial turf.

There are currently no teams from the Lima Metropolitan area with all clubs representing cities from the country's interior.

Universidad César Vallejo, Total Clean, Cobresol, José Gálvez, Los Caimanes, and Comerciantes Unidos are the only clubs outside the metropolitan area of Lima to have won a Segunda Division championship.

In the course of this era, Telmo Carbajo, Ciclista Lima, Unión Callao, Carlos Concha and Mariscal Sucre shared the most titles.