The Cat SG was founded in 1971 at a meeting of international cat specialists at Lion Safari in Florida. Professor Paul Leyhausen of the Max Planck Institute for Physiology of Behaviour in Germany was elected Chairman, and held the chair until 1982. He was succeeded by Dr Norman Myers, a British conservation scientist. In 1983, Peter Jackson, a British specialist on the tiger, was appointed to the Chair, and served until his retirement in 2000, while remaining an active member of the group. He was succeeded by Swiss carnivore specialists, Drs Urs and Christine Breitenmoser.

In 1996, the Cat SG's major work, "Wild Cats: Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan" (IUCN 1996) was published. It became a standard reference on the natural history of the cats.

Cat News, a newsletter for Cat SG members and for others interested in the wild cats, was launched in 1983. The bi-annual publication is now in its 22^nd year. Scientific papers and news reports are included in major reference lists, as well as being cited in many publications on the wild cats.

Under the chairmanship of Drs Urs and Christine Breitenmoser, a Core Group meets intermittently to review the work of the Cat SG and to decide on policy matters.

In 2000, when Peter Jackson retired, he donated his library to the Cat Specialist Group. In 2002, the Digital Cat Library, the electronic version of documents relevant to cat conservation went online.

In 2005 the Cat Specialist Group Webportal together with its family of adjoined websites goes online.