Notable Jewish residents included Rabbi Zev Wolf of Zbaraz, the singer Velvel Zbarjer and the author Ida Fink.

First attested in 1211 as a strong Ruthenian fortress, Zbarazh became a seat of the Gediminid princes Zbaraski towards the end of the 14th century.

Following the 1569 Union of Lublin, Zbarazh became part of Kingdom of Poland's Krzemieniec County and Volhynian Voivodeship.

After the first partition of Poland (1772), the town was seized by the Habsburg monarchy, and remained in the province of Galicia until 1918.

After the conflict, Zbarazh returned to Poland, becoming the seat of a county in Tarnopol Voivodeship.

[3] Zbarazh was occupied by the Germans on July 4, 1941, but before the occupation authority was in place, Ukrainian nationalists instigated a pogrom that murdered twenty Jews and burned two synagogues.

By the time of the German invasion, the Jewish population of around 3000 had swelled to around 5000 because of refugees from western Poland.

Local Poles were ordered to move to the Recovered Territories, and Soviet authorities began a process of devastation.

The new Zbarazh Castle was designed for Prince Jeremi Wiśniowiecki in a post-Palladian Italian idiom similar to Scamozzi's by the Dutch architect van Peyen in 1626–31.

Defended for 43 days by Polish troops under Jeremi Wiśniowiecki (10 July–22 August), it was not captured.

In the main nave of the church there was a commemorative plaque in memory of the 100th birth anniversary of Adam Mickiewicz.