[4] Joey Levin, who previously led the company's search and applications segment,[5] has served as chief executive officer since June 2015.

[6] IAC was established in 1986 as Silver King Broadcasting Company, as part of a plan to increase viewership of the Home Shopping Network (HSN) by purchasing local television stations.

[9] In August 1995, Barry Diller acquired control of Silver King, in a deal backed by the company's largest shareholder, Liberty Media.

In December 1996, Silver King acquired an 80% stake in HSN for $1.3 billion in stock, and changed its own name to HSN, Inc.[12][13][14] At the same time, the company acquired Savoy Pictures, a failed film studio that owned four Fox affiliate stations through SF Broadcasting, for $210 million in stock.

[15] HSN purchased a controlling stake in Ticketmaster Group in July 1997,[16] and then acquired the rest of the company in June 1998.

[27] In the early 2000s, USA Networks began divesting itself of its traditional television broadcasting and production units.

[32] Following the shift in focus to online assets, the company changed its name to USA Interactive (USAI)[33] in May 2002;[34] InterActiveCorp in June 2003;[35] and finally to IAC/InterActiveCorp in July 2004.

[36] In August 2003, IAC acquired the online mortgage comparison site LendingTree,[37] and in September, the company added discount travel website Hotwire.com to its growing list of acquisitions.

[38] In October, IAC agreed to buy French travel site Anyway.com from Transat A.T. for $62.7 million.

[39] In 2004 and 2005, IAC continued its growth through acquisition, adding assets including Tripadvisor,[40] ServiceMagic,[41] and Ask Jeeves.

[48] In August 2008, IAC spun off several of its businesses, including: Tree.com (formerly LendingTree), the Home Shopping Network, Ticketmaster, and Interval International.

[53] IAC's largest shareholder, Liberty Media, exited the company in 2010, following a protracted dispute over the 2008 spinoffs.

[59] On December 22, 2013, IAC fired their director of corporate communications, Justine Sacco, after an AIDS joke she posted to Twitter went viral,[60] being re-tweeted and scorned around the world.

[68] In January 2020, IAC withdrew its financial backing for CollegeHumor and its sister websites and sold the websites to Chief Creative Officer Sam Reich; IAC remains a minority owner of Reich's rebranded company Dropout.

In October 2021, IAC announced the acquisition of Meredith Corporation's National Media Group for $2.7 billion.