Originally founded by Richard M. Schulze and James Wheeler in 1966 as an audio specialty store called Sound of Music, it was rebranded under its current name with an emphasis on consumer electronics in 1983.

[9] On August 22, 1966, Richard M. Schulze and a business partner opened Sound of Music, an electronics store specializing in high fidelity stereos in St. Paul, Minnesota.

[20] The Burnsville location featured a high-volume, low-price business model, which was borrowed partially from Schulze's successful Tornado Sale in 1981.

[21][22] In 1988, Best Buy was in a price and location war with Detroit-based appliance chain Highland Superstores, and Schulze attempted to sell the company to Circuit City for US$30 million.

[21] Upset that their products would no longer be pushed by salespeople, some suppliers such as Maytag, Whirlpool, and Sony stopped selling in Best Buy stores altogether.

[22] In January 2001, Best Buy acquired Musicland Stores Corporation, a Minnetonka, Minnesota-based retailer that sold home-entertainment products under the Sam Goody, Suncoast Motion Picture Company, Media Play, and OnCue brands.

[22][30] Later that year, Best Buy acquired the British Columbia, Canada-based electronics-chain Future Shop Ltd., marking its entrance to the international marketplace.

[35] In October, Best Buy acquired Minneapolis-based Geek Squad, then a 24-hour residential computer repair business with offices in Minneapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

The acquisition was worth $80 million, and under terms of the deal, Speakeasy began operating as a wholly owned subsidiary of Best Buy.

[48] In October 2007, Best Buy became the first consumer-electronics retailer to exit the analog television market, carrying only digital products that became mandatory in June 2009 by the FCC.

[54] In July 2008, Best Buy announced that it would start selling musical instruments and related gear in over 80 of its retail stores, making the company the second-largest musical-instrument distributor in the US.

[3][66] In December 2011, Best Buy purchased mindSHIFT Technologies, a company that provided IT support for small and medium-sized businesses, for $167 million.

[71] In April 2013, Best Buy exited the European consumer electronics market when it sold its 50% stake in The Carphone Warehouse back to the UK-based mobile phone retailer.

[75] On March 1, 2018, the company announced that it would shut down its 250 standalone Best Buy Mobile stores in the United States by the end of May, due to low revenue and high costs.

[77] On July 2, 2018, Best Buy announced it was cutting the amount of store space devoted to selling physical music, citing the popularity of streaming services as having reduced sales.

[78] On April 15, 2019, Best Buy announced that in June 2019, its current CFO, Corie Barry, would replace Hubert Joly[6] who held the position of CEO since August 2012.

[79] In August 2022, Best Buy said it would be laying off employees across the country after warnings of weaker sales, and the company cut its forecast for the remainder of 2022.

[83] Best Buy sells consumer electronics and a variety of related merchandise, including software, video games, music, mobile phones, digital cameras, car stereos, and video cameras, in addition to home appliances (washing machines, dryers, and refrigerators), in a noncommissioned sales environment.

[84] The building exteriors of Best Buy-branded stores are typically light brown, with the entrance designed to look like a blue box emerging from the structure.

[85] Corporate employees operated under a results only work environment from 2005 until March 2013, when the management style was abandoned by Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly.

[3] Best Buy exited the European market in April 2013, selling its stake in the business back to its partner Carphone Warehouse.

[72][73] Best Buy also produces products under eight house brands:[3] In 2000, two Florida consumers brought a lawsuit against the company, alleging that it engaged in fraudulent business practices related to the sale of extended warranties (or, more accurately, service plans).

[90] In the second quarter of 2007, Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal ordered an investigation into the company's use of an in-store website alleged to have misled customers on item sales prices.

[92] On April 26, 2008, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) fined the company $280,000 for not alerting customers that the analog televisions it sold would not receive over-the-air stations after the digital transition on June 12, 2009.

[95] Since that time, however, the company launched what it calls Greener Together to increase the energy efficiency of its products, and reduce consumer waste through more recyclable packaging and proper disposal of certain electronic components such as rechargeable batteries and empty ink cartridges.

[96] As a way to improve its image and past environmental issues, the company introduced a recycling program in 2009 that has since collected nearly half-a-billion pounds of consumer electronics and e-waste, and is available at all their stores for a nominal fee.

In 2011, the company purchased nearly 119 million kilowatt-hours of green power – electricity generated from renewable resources, such as wind, solar, geothermal, biogas, biomass, and low-impact hydropower.

[98] In their attempt to combat child pornography, the FBI hired several Best Buy employees from the Geek Squad division to covertly work for them flagging potential targets.

In one incident, a customer brought in his computer for troubleshooting, which a Best Buy employee flagged as containing images of child pornography and reported to the FBI.

[99] On October 20, 2023, CBC News released the results of a Marketplace investigation which found that Best Buy technicians had viewed private files, such as intimate photos, on customer devices.