ELPA first staged the Acropolis Rally in 1951, making it one of rallying's oldest continuous competitions. When the WRC was inaugurated after 1973, the event became a permanent round and quickly earned a reputation as one of the championship's most punishing tests. Early editions were true marathons, with crews covering up to 800 competitive kilometres across locations spanning the length of Greece — from stages near Mount Olympus and the Kalambaka/Meteora area in the north to the Peloponnese in the south. The traditional opening ceremony was held beneath the Acropolis in Athens, with the finish conducted at the Panathenaic stadium.
Like all WRC rounds, the Acropolis Rally gradually shifted from marathon-style competition toward shorter sprint-format events during the 1990s and 2000s. Service parks and rally headquarters migrated between cities — Lamia, Itea, and Loutraki near the Corinth Canal — as the event's logistical footprint contracted. In 2005, headquarters moved to the Athens Olympic Sports Complex, where a superspecial stage run inside the main stadium drew packed crowds and earned the event the "Rally of the Year" award for that season. In 2006 two superspecials were held at the same stadium. Subsequent editions moved their service parks to the Markopoulo Olympic Equestrian Centre and Tatoi military airport before the rally relocated southward to Loutraki in 2009, using stages in Argolis and Corinthia.
The rally was absent from the WRC calendar for a prolonged period before Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis publicly backed its return in August 2020. In March 2021, organisers confirmed the Acropolis Rally of Gods would re-enter the WRC calendar for the 2021 season, based in Lamia with the legendary Tarzan test reinstated as the power stage.
The Acropolis Rally's reputation rests on a combination of factors that drivers routinely compare to the Safari Rally in Africa. Cockpit temperatures regularly reach 50 °C during summer stages, while the roads are strewn with sharp rocks that shred tyres and destroy suspension components. Dust clouds obscure visibility and coat mechanical components. Cars must be built with reinforced underbodies and extra cooling capacity simply to survive the stages. Drivers and co-drivers must balance outright pace against the constant risk of terminally damaging their cars.
The best competitive kilometres are concentrated in the Phthiotis and Phokis regions, around the Parnassus and Giona mountains. Stages such as Bauxites/Karoutes, Pavliani, Kaloskopi, Elatia, and Drosohori are rated among the fastest and most flowing tests in Greece, allowing cars to reach high speeds before the terrain demands restraint. Other classic tests in Boeotia, Corinthia, and Attica — including Kineta, Aghi Theodori, and the Parnitha stage — have featured over the decades. Many have been permanently closed as the underlying roads were asphalted.
The most celebrated single test in Acropolis Rally history is the Tarzan stage, a 30.3-kilometre route in the Evrytania region originally known as the Fourna and Rentina test. The name honours Giorgos Burgos, a local police officer from Fourna who survived a tuberculosis diagnosis that gave him months to live, eventually reaching the age of 92. The stage was first referred to as "Tarzan" at the 26th Acropolis Rally in 1979. It appeared continuously until 1995 and its final four years ran under the combined name Rentina-Tarzan. A shortened 20.65-kilometre version called New Tarzan was staged twice at the event's 50th anniversary edition in 2003 as a tribute to its legacy. The stage returned for the 2021 edition as the power stage. Didier Auriol destroyed a wheel rim and suspension on the full Tarzan route during the 1991 event, losing the lead and eventual victory, yet he later named it his favourite stage in the entire Acropolis calendar.
The roll of Acropolis Rally winners reads as a summary of WRC history. Walter Röhrl, Björn Waldegård, Ari Vatanen, Stig Blomqvist, Juha Kankkunen, Carlos Sainz, and Colin McRae all claimed victories in Greece. The extreme conditions act as a significant filter, rewarding mechanical sympathy and strategic tyre management as much as outright speed.
The Acropolis Rally occupies a distinct place in the WRC landscape as one of the few events that genuinely tests a car to destruction rather than simply testing crew pace. Its more than seventy-year history, iconic stages in the mountains of central Greece, and proven ability to produce dramatic results make it one of the calendar's most respected fixtures. The event's 2021 return was greeted as a homecoming by drivers and fans who had long argued the WRC was diminished in its absence.