AFL Women

In 2010, the AFL commissioned a report into the state of women's football around the country. Along with findings concerning grassroots and junior football, the report recommended the AFL Commission begin working toward the establishment of a national women's league. While the option of new stand-alone clubs was considered, a model using the resources and branding of existing AFL clubs was to be the preferred model for the planned league.

The first on-field step towards the competition took place in early 2013, when the AFL announced an exhibition match to be played between women's teams representing Melbourne and Western Bulldogs in June of that year. On 15 May 2013, the first women's draft was held, establishing the playing lists for the two clubs in the forthcoming exhibition match. The match played on 29 June 2013 marked the first time two women's sides had competed under the banners of AFL clubs. A crowd of 7,518 watched the historic match, which Melbourne won by 35 points. The exhibition match became a series between the clubs, with another game played in 2014 and two played in 2015, the last of which – on 16 August 2015 – was the first women's AFL game to be broadcast on free-to-air television. It attracted an average audience of 175,000, surpassing the 114,000 average audience for the AFL men's clash of the previous day, between Adelaide and Essendon.

The success of these exhibition matches prompted the AFL to accelerate its plans for a nationwide women's competition, announcing a preferred start date of 2017. Prior to this, the league had announced only aspirational plans to have the women's competition established by 2020. The already-planned 2016 exhibition series was expanded at this time, with a total of ten matches to be played in venues across the country and featuring a range of new temporary representative teams.

In 2016, the AFL opened a process for existing clubs to tender applications to join the new competition. The 18 clubs in the men's league had until 29 April 2016 to place a bid for a licence, with 13 clubs making bids: Adelaide, Brisbane, Carlton, Collingwood, Fremantle, Geelong, Greater Western Sydney, Melbourne, North Melbourne, Richmond, St Kilda, West Coast, and Western Bulldogs. The AFL's preferred distribution of clubs was four clubs from Victoria and one each from New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, and Western Australia.

The inaugural teams were announced on 8 June 2016. Adelaide, Brisbane, and Greater Western Sydney were the only teams to bid in their respective states and were granted licences to compete in 2017. Both Western Australian clubs made bids, with Fremantle's bid chosen ahead of the bid from West Coast. Eight Victorian clubs made bids: Melbourne, Western Bulldogs, Carlton and Collingwood were successful, with Geelong, North Melbourne, Richmond and St Kilda being unsuccessful but granted provisional licences.

Details about the branding of the league were released in the second half of 2016. On 15 September 2016, the AFL announced that the league would be named "AFL Women's" or AFLW for short, with the logo being unveiled on 19 September 2016. The logo is a stylised rendition of an Australian rules football ground goal square and goal posts, drawn from a perspective that resembles a "W". On 10 October 2016, the National Australia Bank was named as the league's naming rights sponsor.

The first premiership game was played at Ikon Park on Friday, 3 February 2017. The AFL had initially planned to host the game at Melbourne's Olympic Park Oval, with a capacity of just 7,000, but was forced to change to Ikon Park due to overwhelming interest and a need for more seating. The match was deemed a "lockout" with a capacity crowd of 24,568 in attendance, with estimates of a few thousand left outside. Gillon McLachlan, the AFL's CEO, personally apologised to those who missed out. The game was also a great success on TV, attracting a national audience of 896,000, including 593,000 metropolitan free-to-air viewers, 180,000 regional free-to-air viewers, and 123,000 on Fox Footy. The Melbourne metropolitan audience of 424,000 was on par with that of Friday-night AFL men's matches.

The inaugural season concluded with the Grand Final held on Saturday, 25 March 2017. The Adelaide Crows were crowned the league's first premiers after defeating the minor premiers, the Brisbane Lions. The scoreline read Adelaide 4.11 (35) def. Brisbane 4.5 (29).

Expansion of the competition occurred in two instalments, with two clubs added in 2019 and four added in 2020, resulting in 14 teams in total.

The 10 AFL clubs not originally participating in the competition were invited to bid for inclusion, with priority given to the five clubs that had submitted unsuccessful bids to participate in the inaugural season. The deadline to lodge submissions was 16 June 2017. The only clubs not to bid were Port Adelaide and Sydney. North Melbourne worked with AFL Tasmania to craft its bid, with the club aiming to play home matches in Melbourne, Hobart, and Launceston, and also to select half of its playing list from Tasmania.

A final decision on which clubs would be admitted to the competition was expected by the end of July 2017, but was delayed several times. On 27 September 2017, the AFL announced that Geelong and North Melbourne had been selected to enter the competition in 2019. North Melbourne retained its commitment to playing matches in Tasmania. The league then added four teams in 2020, with the AFL selecting Gold Coast, Richmond, St Kilda and West Coast to join the competition. The growth in clubs for the 2019 season was accompanied by the introduction of an American-style conference structure, which was abandoned after the 2020 season in favour of the traditional single ladder. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 season was curtailed and eventually cancelled without a premiership awarded.

On 12 August 2021, the other four AFL clubs without AFLW licenses – Essendon, Hawthorn, Port Adelaide and Sydney – were granted entry into the competition, to commence in AFL Women's season seven.