The University, situated in the ancient capital city of Xi’an, one of the four internationally renowned historical and cultural cities, was founded in 1944 under its original name "Shaanxi Provincial Teachers’ College", and then renamed "Xi’an Teachers’ College" in 1954. In 1960, it merged with "Shaanxi Teachers’ College" to become " Shaanxi Normal University ". In 1978, it was brought under the direct administration of the Ministry of Education of China.
During its more than 60-year history in education, the University, while rooted in China’s West, has embraced the whole country, developed a school spirit of “Morality, Learning, Aspiration and Action” and has seen itself become firmly established in Western China as an influential top-tier comprehensive teachers training university, as it strives to achieve the goal of building itself to be a major comprehensive research university distinguished by its teacher education.