The airport first opened its doors on September 13, 1925. During World War II, the German occupying forces enhanced the airport for military use by constructing a 1,200m concrete runway. In the years immediately following the war, the airport served as a significant transport hub, but its importance declined in the 1950s with the rise of Warsaw Airport. By the end of that decade, regular passenger flights to Łódź had come to a halt. Efforts to revive passenger services were initiated in the 1990s.
On October 31, 2002, the airport implemented an ILS/DME system.
In September 2005, the runway was extended from 1,443 meters to 2,100 meters to accommodate larger aircraft, such as the Boeing 737. Terminal 2, which can handle approximately 300,000 passengers annually, opened on October 28, 2005. Just two days later, the first Boeing 737 landed at Łódź Airport. The runway was further lengthened to 2,500 meters on January 19, 2007.
In June 2012, Terminal 3 was opened, boasting a capacity of 1.5 to 2 million passengers each year—over five times that of the old terminal. Terminal 2 was dismantled and sold to the new airport in Radom. The airport was named after Władysław Reymont, the renowned Polish writer of the 20th century and the 1924 Nobel Prize laureate in Literature.
After the A2 motorway connecting Łódź and Warsaw opened in 2012, cutting travel time between the two cities to roughly an hour, Łódź Airport began to experience increased competition from the airports in Warsaw (Chopin and Modlin). This resulted in a drop in passenger numbers. Following the bankruptcy of OLT Express in July 2012, which had intended to operate several international flights, the airport stopped its domestic services. Due to the low number of passengers, Łódź Airport has been pointed out as an example of the inefficient use of EU subsidies.