Its studios and business offices are located on Cushman Drive (near US 1) in northeast Columbia; master control is based at company flagship WCCB in Charlotte, North Carolina.

[3] The First Carolina Corporation, a group of local investors, obtained a construction permit from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to build a new station on channel 25 on June 1, 1961, after applying on August 5, 1960.

Although it decently covered Columbia and most of its inner suburbs in Richland and Lexington counties, it only provided grade B signal coverage of the second-largest city in the market, Sumter, and was all but unviewable in some outlying areas even after the 1981 power increase.

[16] As part of the SAFER Act, WOLO-TV kept its analog signal on the air until June 26 to inform viewers of the digital television transition through a loop of public service announcements from the National Association of Broadcasters.

[23] In the second half of the 1990s, the station made several moves, including hiring Jim Blue and Leslie Mattox as its top anchor team, additional morning and 5 p.m. newscasts, and a rebrand as 25 Eyewitness News, to improve its position,[24][25] However, just two months after hiring Blue and Mattox, Bahakel fired the general manager and news director.

This was one of the largest-market examples of "centralcasting" (the practice of housing master control and/or other operations for multiple stations out of one facility) in the United States.

[28] After the company's financial picture improved and allowed it to afford more digital conversion costs, in the fall of 2005, Bahakel Communications moved production of WOLO's newscasts back to Columbia, from a new purpose-built streetside news studio located across from the State House in the historic Union National Bank Building.

In 2015, the station garnered attention when it first hired popular former WIS anchor Ben Hoover to its evening newscasts in August[30] after his departure from the NBC affiliate back in 2014.

[31] In October, former WIS chief meteorologist John Farley was hired to replace Reg Taylor, who retired from television at the end of September.

The station launched a new look, music, and a finalized studio for the debut in mid-October, with scenes of the capital city and the State House being particularly prominent in its imagery, tying to its unique location at the intersection of Main and Gervais streets.

In 2022, the station had to move its newsroom and streetside studio out of its location in downtown Columbia after the ownership of the building decided to change its use.