Dr. Muhammad Yunus was inspired during the Bangladesh famine of 1974 to make a small personal loan of US$27 to a group of 42 families as start-up money so that they could make items for sale, without the burdens of high interest under predatory lending. Yunus believed that making such loans available to a larger population could stimulate businesses and reduce the widespread rural poverty in Bangladesh.

Nobel Laureate Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the bank's founder:
Yunus developed the principles of the Grameen Bank from his research and experience. Grameen Bank is Bengali for "Rural" or "Village" Bank.He began a research project, together with a national commercial bank and the University of Chittagong, extending microcredit to test his method for providing credit and banking services to the rural poor.The Grameen Bank project started in 1976 as an action research pilot project in "Jobra" village in Chattogram district of Bangladesh. In 1983, the pilot project was transformed into a bank with the aim of alleviating poverty and empowering the marginalized poor in Bangladesh through micro-credit.

The unique feature of Grameen Bank is that no collateral is required to get the credit from the bank. Unlike mainstream commercial banks that bring their clients to their shiny branch premises where the poor are afraid to be trampled, Grameen Bank carries its services to the comfort zone of its clients’ doorsteps. It has inspired the women and the weaker section of the communities to join the Grameen fraternity. All banking transactions except loan disbursement are done in the meetings of the borrowers at the village level centers organized by the center managers.  Grameen Bank's strong presence in remote areas of the country bears witness to this fact. Grameen Bank has always made it a priority to empower women and involve them in economic activities. As a result, Grameen Bank can proudly say that 98% of its borrowers are women. More than two-thirds of these women have moved on to better lives through poverty alleviation.

Grameen Bank now operates in 40 Zonal offices, 40 Zonal Audit offices, 240 Area Offices, and 2568 Branch offices and the number of employees as of December 2024 stood at 23,397. Grameen Bank is currently present in 81678 (94%) villages in the country and provides services to nearly 45 million people (including family members) through 10.64 million borrower members. Grameen Bank's microcredit program is being implemented as a successful model in alleviating poverty in many countries of the world. Grameen Bank was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 in appreciation of its efforts to create economic and social development from the bottom of the society through microcredit. Grameen Bank is working not just to alleviate the poverty of its borrower members, but also to ensure that their future generations are not left behind. It offers education loans, new entrepreneurship loans, and scholarships to borrower members' children. Grameen Bank's most humanitarian and exceptional program is the Struggle (Beggar) Members Program.

Grameen Bank offers interest-free loans to help beggars build financial capacity so that they don't have to beg anymore. Already 21,383 members have given up begging and become self-sufficient.

Up to December 2024, the cumulative amount of loan disbursement by Grameen Bank, since inception, stood at US$ 39,674.37 million (BDT 3,249,229.45 million) to 10.65 million borrower members, 97% of whom are female members. Following an exceptional banking practice, Grameen Bank has ensured a lucrative recovery rate of 95.99% (as of December 2024) which is comparatively higher than any other banking systems. 

As of December 2024, the outstanding loans of the bank are US$ 1,365.97 million (BDT 163,916.36 million) and the balance of the deposit is US$ 1,872.42 million (BDT 235,891.59 million).

The success indicators of Grameen Bank are now much higher than that of at any other time in the past due to the charismatic and dynamic leadership of its present Board of Directors and Management Team.

Grameen Bank has been actively contributing to the development of Bangladesh.