It is located midway between the sea resorts of Ureki and Kobuleti, 21 km west of Ozurgeti, the main town of Guria.

On 5 March 1829, Major-General Karl Hesse at the head of a force of 1,200 Russian regulars and some 1,500 Gurian militiamen stormed and destroyed a large fortified Ottoman camp at Limani, close to Shekvetili.

[6] During the Crimean War, on the night of 15–16 October 1853, a superior Ottoman force of three or five battalions, including bashi-bazouks, led by Hasan and Ali Beys and Dede Ağa, natives of Çürüksu, stormed Shekvetili, held by two companies of Russian infantry and a local Georgian militia under Captain Shcherbakov, and captured the post after hours of a pitched battle.

Atrocities committed by the bashi-bazouks in and around Shekvetili alienated local Muslim Georgians, who had initially welcomed the Ottoman advance.

The Russian casualties amounted to nearly 1,000 killed, including Captain Shcherbakov and Georgian militia commander Prince Giorgi Gurieli, and 80 captured, while the Turks lost 32 dead and 59 wounded.