[2] Writer Steve Englehart has stated that he added the Valkyrie to the Defenders in issue #4 "to provide some texture to the group.

Steve Gerber first worked on the characters in Giant-Size Defenders #3 (January 1975) and became the writer of the main title with issue #20 the following month.

[7] In 2010, Comics Bulletin ranked Gerber and Sal Buscema's run on The Defenders first on its list of the "Top 10 1970s Marvels".

[10] Kraft later recalled that reactions to the off-beat humor in his "Defender for a Day" storyline in issues #62–64 were polarized: "readers were either wildly enthusiastic or absolutely and very utterly appalled.

Perlin later commented, "It turned out to be a real fun book because you got a chance to draw almost every character Marvel had at one time or another.

[22] The "New Defenders" concept provided a substantial boost to the series's sales, but left DeMatteis in a creative drought, as he realized in retrospect that "...I created a book that was exactly the kind of the thing that I hated to write.

I made it into a standard superhero team..."[15] DeMatteis stayed on for only six issues of The New Defenders before turning it over to writer Peter Gillis.

In 2008 Joe Casey wrote a new miniseries with a new line-up of Defenders as a result of the Super-Human Registration Act and the events of the Civil War.

[27] Marvel launched a new Defenders series in December 2011, written by Matt Fraction and drawn by Terry Dodson.

The new book features Doctor Strange, Red She-Hulk, Namor, the Silver Surfer and Iron Fist.

[29] In August 2017, Marvel launched a new Defenders comic book series starring Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage and Iron Fist, based on the Netflix incarnation of the team.