1873–1939: early years The club was founded as
Halifax in 1873 when a group of young men from the Halifax Rifle Volunteers put an advert in the local press to invite anyone interested in "football" to a meeting at the Upper George Hotel. A year later, Halifax played their first inter-club rugby football game when they played Leeds Athletic Club in a match held at Woodhouse Moor in Leeds on the 21st of November 1874. This first game resulted in a draw. The first home game was played a month later against Wakefield Trinity on a cricket field in King Cross Street, which again resulted in a draw. In these early years, matches were played at Ovenden, Savile Park and Hanson Lane. Despite victory in the inaugural
Regal Trophy Final (called the Players No. 6 Trophy for sponsorship purposes) in 1971–72, financial problems continued for the next decade. In 1983, local businessman, David Brook provided much needed investment in the club. In the lead-up, the Halifax President, Tony Gartland, and former Chairman, Peter Marsland, left the board over plans to merge with rivals
Bradford Northern and join the proposed Super League as single club. Halifax joined the Super League in 1996, the local newspaper did a poll of suggested nicknames for the club with Halifax Bombers topping the list. But the Board upon the recommendation of Chief executive Nigel Wood chose
Halifax Blue Sox. However, this proved to be unpopular with most supporters who continued to refer to them as 'Fax'. Halifax finished third in Super League in 1998 under
John Pendlebury. Halifax sold
Thrum Hall for £1.5 million to
Asda for a supermarket development in 1998, and moved across town to their present home,
the Shay stadium, which they share with the town's football club
Halifax Town. The proceeds from the sale were supposed to enable Halifax RLFC to make a contribution to the costs of a redevelopment of the Shay stadium, but the money was swallowed up by debts. Under Chief Executive Nigel Wood, Halifax went to
Jacksonville University,
Florida, in 2000 to help develop American rugby league, along with
Salford.
Steve Linnane joined the club as assistant coach from
Rochdale Hornets and took full charge after
Gary Mercer's resignation. With the club threatened again by financial problems and the danger of relegation Halifax sacked coach Steve Linnane in August 2002, the morning after a 64–0 loss to St. Helens, which came after nine losses from ten games which put the club at risk of relegation. Replacement Tony Anderson signed a deal that covered the four remaining matches of this season.
2003–2008: relegation and financial difficulties The club returned to their traditional Halifax RLFC name at the start of 2003. At the end of the 2003 season they were relegated from
Super League to
National League One. Halifax's financial troubles meant they were unable to retain a full-time team and they struggled in the new league. In 2004 having been saved from insolvency by their new chairman Howard Posner they narrowly avoided a second relegation to National League 2, with a last-gasp victory in a play-off with
York City Knights.
Anthony Farrell was asked to become temporary coach until the end of the year following the sacking of Tony Anderson. After saving the club from relegation the following season and taking the club within a whisker of a place in the grand final, they lost out to
Castleford. The year after was less successful and after a poor series of results including a club record loss to
Hull Kingston Rovers, Farrell lost his job.
Martin Hall took over the role of head coach in June 2006. In August 2006, Halifax was on the verge of going bust. The club announced that it needed to raise £90,000 or it would go into liquidation. Rugby league fans nationwide rallied behind 'Fax', and through visits to the ground during home fixtures and other fund-raising events, were able to raise £55,000. Howard Posner then came forward and announced that he would loan the club the remaining £35,000 in order to keep Halifax alive, repayment of the loan was waived. Posner and the new board of directors subsequently invested further sums to ensure the club could survive and that Halifax would be playing in National League One during 2007. Howard Posner, again became club Chairman and
Martin Hall took up the post of director of football in October 2006. Assistant coach
Matt Calland was then named the new head coach of Halifax.
2009–2025: rebuilding and championship success In the
2009 Challenge Cup Halifax came within moments of reaching the quarter-finals, losing by one point in extra time to Castleford. They also lost the final of the Co-Operative Championship to
Barrow 26-18. However, Barrow were later stripped of the title due to salary cap breaches. In April 2010, with the club on a sound financial footing, Howard Posner stepped down as chairman and was replaced by long time supporter and director Michael Steele. In 2010, Halifax won the Co-Operative Championship, beating
Featherstone Rovers 23–22 in the final after extra time. It was the first trophy Halifax had won in 23 years. But the club were not promoted back to Super League as promotion to super league was on a franchise basis at that time. In 2011, Halifax reached the
Northern Rail Cup Final at
Bloomfield Road,
Blackpool, losing narrowly to
Leigh in the last minute. They were also unable to defend their Championship title, losing heavily to
Sheffield Eagles in the play-offs.
Karl Harrison took over as head coach at the end of the season. The following season, Halifax made it to the final of the Northern Rail Cup but this time were victorious over favourites Featherstone Rovers beating them 21–12 in a match watched by over 7,000 spectators. In 2015 Halifax finished the regular season in the top four of the Championship, earning them a place in the qualifiers. Despite being the lowest ranked team in the competition, and part-time, they beat promotion favourites
Leigh and Sheffield Eagles to finish 6th out of 8, and secured improved central funding for 2016. After a disappointing 6th place finish in 2016, the club again reached the qualifiers in 2017 and 2018 finishing 3rd and 4th respectively. This made the club the most successful part-time team in the RFL. Long serving director and chairman Michael Steele stepped down from the Board at the end of 2017. In December 2020, Halifax RLFC adopted the name
Halifax Panthers. In the 2021 Championship season, Halifax Panthers finished in third place and qualified for the play-offs. After defeating Whitehaven in the first week, Halifax travelled to Featherstone with the winner to play
Toulouse Olympique in the
Million Pound Game. Halifax would lose the match 42-10 which ended their season. It was also the final game for the retiring
Scott Grix. In the
2022 RFL Championship season, Halifax finished third and qualified for the play-offs. However, they would be eliminated in the first week of the play-offs by
York City losing 26-24. In September 2024, the club was threatened with closure due to an outstanding bill to
HMRC. On 11 September 2024, the club managed to stave off liquidation after paying their outstanding debt to the HMRC. Halifax started the
2025 RFL Championship season in fine form winning their opening six matches of the campaign. They would eventually finish the 2025 RFL Championship season in 5th place on the table.
2026–present: liquidation and resurrection Off the field the situation was not good. A further winding-up petition was issued against the club in 2025, again for debts due to HMRC. This time the club was not able to stave off the liquidation and a winding-up order against the Panthers parent company, Halifax Rugby League Football Club Limited, was made on 9 February 2026. Two days later, the club's membership of the RFL was terminated. At the same time, an application to transfer the RFL membership to a new company Halifax RLFC (Trading) Ltd was refused, but three expressions of interest in forming a new club were identified. On 3 March 2026, the RFL announced that they had granted membership approval for a new Halifax Panthers club and that they would be re-instated to the 2026 Championship but with a 12-point deduction. The new owners retained coach,
Kyle Eastmond, and are expected to re-sign the 14 players whose contracts expired and had not yet signed contracts with other clubs. ==Stadiums==