The company produces and presents a full season of theatre and arts education programming, performing to approximately 150,000 patrons annually.

[1] Founded in 1966 by Susan Douglas Rubeš,[2] YPT originally operated out of the now-demolished Colonnade Theatre on Bloor Street.

YPT operates two performance spaces at 165 Front Street East: the Ada Slaight Stage and the Nathan Cohen Studio.

[5] Several stage and screen actors have appeared on the YPT mainstage since the 1970s, including Martin Short, Megan Follows, Brent Carver, Cynthia Dale, Fiona Reid, Gordon Pinsent, R.H Thomson, Sheila McCarthy and Eric Peterson.

In 2016 YPT was one of a number of theatres offering free tickets to newly arrived Syrian refugees.

YPT was given an Award of Merit by the Toronto Historical Board in 1979, "for its imaginative and sympathetic treatment of a landmark that might otherwise have been destroyed".