[6] Its Polish name Tarnopol means 'Tarnowski's city' and stems from a combination of the founder's family name and the Greek term polis.

[7][8] The city served as a military stronghold and castle [6] On 15 April 1540,[6] the King of Poland, Sigismund I the Old,[6] in Kraków gave Tarnowski permission to establish Tarnopol,[6] near Sopilcze (Sopilche).

[9] During the 1672–1676 Polish–Ottoman War, Tarnopol was almost completely destroyed by Turkish forces of Ibrahim Shishman Pasha in 1675, then rebuilt by Aleksander Koniecpolski.

[6] After the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the city was proclaimed as part of the West Ukrainian People's Republic on 11 November 1918.

In July and August 1920, the Red Army captured Ternopil in the course of the Polish-Soviet War, and the city served as the capital of the short-lived Galician Soviet Socialist Republic.

Following the Act of restoration of the Ukrainian state proclaimed in Lviv on 30 June 1941, Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) was active in Ternopil region and battled for the independence of Ukraine, opposing Nazis, Polish underground Armia Krajowa and People's Army of Poland as well as the Soviets.

[6] Following the Potsdam Conference in 1945, Poland's borders were redrawn and Ternopil was incorporated into the Ukrainian SSR of the Soviet Union.

[32] Shukhevych was the military leader of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army during World War II and was known for his collaboration with the Nazi regime[33][34] as well as his responsibility for the massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia.

[35] Joel Lion, the Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine, expressed Israel’s strong objection to the city's choice to name the stadium in honor of Roman Shukhevych.

[34][36] The Eastern Europe Director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, Efraim Zuroff wrote, "It is fully understandable that Ternopil seeks to honor those who fought against Soviet Communism, but not those behind the mass murder of innocent fellow citizens."

in a statement attempting to convince Ternopil to reconsider the "renaming of its stadium in honor of Nazi collaborator, Hauptmann of the SS Schutzmannschaft 201, Roman Shukhevych, an active participant in the mass murder of Jews and Poles in World War II.

"[37] In June 2022, due to full-scale Russian invasion and missile strikes from the territory of Belarus, Ternopil suspended its partnership with the city of Pinsk.

An international open-air music festival called Faine Misto [uk] has been held annually near Ternopil for 2–4 days in July since 2013.