The JGTC was established in 1993 by the Japan Automobile Federation to replace two Japanese championships that were being retired: the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship for Group C prototypes and the Japanese Touring Car Championship for Group A machinery. The founding philosophy was explicitly aimed at avoiding the cost escalation and one-team dominance that had characterized both preceding series. Strict limits on power and weight penalties for race winners were built into the regulations from the outset.
The GT Association was set up in October 1993 to manage the JGTC beginning in 1994, when the defining two-class GT500 and GT300 structure was introduced. Toyota, Nissan, and Honda all established factory programs in GT500 from early in the series' history. The championship expanded internationally during the early 2000s, adding a round at Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia in 2000 and running a non-championship exhibition race at California Speedway in the United States in 2004.
The series was renamed to Super GT in 2005 after plans to hold a race in China meant the championship would operate in more than two countries and would therefore lose its classification as a Japanese national championship under FIA rules. To continue, the series needed direct FIA authorization as an international championship, which prompted the renaming. The originally proposed name, Super GT World Challenge, was rejected by the FIA due to potential confusion with the term "World Championship" and a dispute with the Sports Car Club of America over the "World Challenge" suffix.
A landmark regulatory collaboration was announced in 2014 when Super GT and the German DTM touring car series agreed to develop unified "Class 1" technical regulations, allowing manufacturers to build a single specification of car capable of racing in both championships. Aerodynamic rules were harmonized and both series adopted a common turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine specification. Technical regulations were fully aligned by 2020. However, DTM switched to a Group GT3-based formula in 2021 following a massive withdrawal of manufacturers, ending the Class 1 partnership in practical terms. Super GT retained the Class 1 specification for its GT500 class despite the DTM's departure.
GT500 is the top class and consists entirely of manufacturer-supported teams representing Toyota, Honda, and Nissan. Since 2014, GT500 cars use single-turbocharged 2.0-liter inline four-cylinder engines producing over 650 horsepower, mounted in purpose-built carbon fiber monocoques. The pace of current GT500 cars is broadly comparable to that of top-tier non-hybrid Le Mans Prototypes.
Iconic GT500 cars have included the Nissan Skyline GT-R, Toyota Supra A80, and Honda NSX NA1 during the early years. Current entries include the Nissan Z RZ34, the revived Toyota GR Supra, and the Honda Prelude. Foreign manufacturers have historically had limited success in GT500; the Porsche 911 GT2 won the teams' title in 1995 and the McLaren F1 GTR won both the drivers' and teams' championships in 1996, the last foreign cars to win GT500 titles.
GT300 hosts a mix of works-backed and independent teams in a much more varied field than GT500. The class includes GT3-specification cars from European manufacturers such as Audi, Mercedes, BMW, Lamborghini, and Ferrari alongside Japanese-built JAF-GT machines. The GT Association worked with constructor Dome to create the Mother Chassis concept, a standardized low-cost GT300 platform introduced in 2014 that allows teams to field cars with the appearance of production vehicles such as the Toyota 86 and Lotus Evora on a common tub with a GTA-branded Nissan engine.
GT300 class performance is balanced by the GT Association and SRO using air restrictor adjustments, minimum weights, ride height changes, and maximum turbo boost limits set on a per-race basis.
Super GT's best-known performance balancing mechanism is the Success Ballast system, known also as Success Weight. Two kilograms of ballast are added per championship point scored, meaning faster cars accumulate weight as the season progresses. The ballast is halved in the penultimate round and removed entirely in the final race for teams that participated in every round. This system has repeatedly kept championship fights open until the final race. Only two GT500 teams, ARTA in 2007 and MOLA in 2012, and one GT300 team, GAINER in 2015, have clinched a drivers' title before the season finale.
Super GT has developed deep connections with international motorsport. Drivers who won the Le Mans 24 Hours and FIA World Endurance Championship with Audi — Benoit Treluyer, Andre Lotterer, and Loic Duval — all competed in GT500. Toyota WEC champions Kazuki Nakajima, Kamui Kobayashi, and Ryo Hirakawa similarly raced in the series. Formula One world champion Jenson Button drove for Team Kunimitsu in 2018 and 2019, winning the GT500 title in 2018. Former F1 drivers Ralf Schumacher, Pedro de la Rosa, and Heikki Kovalainen have also competed in the series at various stages of their careers.
Super GT races at Fuji Speedway, Suzuka Circuit, Mobility Resort Motegi, Autopolis, Okayama International Circuit, and Sportsland Sugo. The Golden Week round at Fuji Speedway, held annually on May 4, is the series' highest-attended event, regularly drawing a two-day crowd exceeding 90,000. The Suzuka endurance round, historically held as the 1000 km race, was replaced by the Intercontinental GT Challenge Suzuka 10 Hours in 2018. An overseas round in Sepang, Malaysia was a fixture of the calendar from 2000 until 2014, when it was replaced by an event at Chang International Circuit in Buriram, Thailand.