The script was in use prior to the introduction of Islam to the Rejang area; the earliest attested document appears to date from the mid-18th century CE.

The term KaGaNga was never used by the users of the script community, but it was coined by the British anthropologist Mervyn A. Jaspan (1926–1975) in his book Folk literature of South Sumatra.

The script was used to write texts in Malay and Rejang, which is now spoken by about 200,000 people living in Indonesia on the island of Sumatra in the southwest highlands, north Bengkulu Province, around Arga Makmur, Muaraaman, Curup, and Kepahiang, and also in the Rawas area of South Sumatra Province, near Muara Kulam.

Most of its users live in fairly remote rural areas, of whom slightly less than half are literate.

The traditional Rejang corpus consists chiefly of ritual texts, medical incantations, and poetry.