Shymkent was founded in the 12th century as a caravanserai to protect the Silk Road town of Sayram, 10 km to the east. Shymkent grew as a market center for trade between nomads and the settled Sogdian peoples. It was destroyed several times: by Genghis Khan, soldiers from the southern Khanates, and by nomad attacks. Once part of the Khanate of Kokand, it became part of the Emirate of Bukhara in 1810 and was then annexed by the Russian Empire in 1864. It was renamed Chernyaev in 1914 and renamed Shymkent in 1924. Following the Russian conquest, Shymkent was a city of trade between nomadic Turks and sedentary Turks, and was famous for its kumis.
During the delineation of the borders of the Soviet Union's Union Republics, Shymkent had a majority Uzbek population, but was assigned to Kazakhstan for political reasons. There was a gulag located near Shymkent, and many Russian-speaking people came to the area via imprisonment.
The name Shymkent comes from two words: shym meaning "turf, and kent meaning "city". Shymkent and Chimkent have identical translations.
After Kazakhstan gained independence, the city was renamed Shymkent in 1993 as part of the government’s campaign to apply Kazakh names to cities. This created an ambiguity in the city's name in the Russian language. The formal spelling of Шымкент (Shymkent) as codified in Kazakhstan's Constitution goes against the Russian spelling rules of never having the letter "ы" follow the letter "ш". As a result, the new name Шымкент (Shymkent) is used only in Kazakhstan, while Russia and some other countries using Russian language keep using the original spelling Чимкент (Chimkent)
