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The Department of General Literature was created in 1888 when the Department of General Literature and Science split into two separate departments.

The Department of General Literature and Science came into being in 1839 in response to the need for a greater differentiation of the syllabus for students of the Senior Department at King's College London. As its name suggests, it constituted a broad faculty or grouping of subjects and classes that provided a core liberal syllabus in the arts and sciences available to all students of King's, including Medical students. Principal subjects included English Literature, Theology, Modern History, Classics, Modern Languages and Mathematics, but later instruction covered subjects as diverse as Geology, Law, Political Economy and Oriental Languages. In 1861 the department was divided into two sections, the General Section and the Oriental Section before dividing further into the Classical Division, Modern Division and the Oriental Section in 1869. The department was reorganised again in 1877 into the Classical Division, Modern Division, Indian Civil Service and Science Division and then renamed as the Department of General Literature and Science in 1878 when the Civil Service Department was opened. The division between General Literature and Science Departments, that took place in 1888, foreshadowed the replacement of General Literature by the new Faculty of Arts in 1893.

The origins of the Faculty of Arts lay in the Department of General Literature and Science. The Department came into being in 1839 in response to the need for a greater differentiation of the syllabus for students of the Senior Department at King's College London. As its name suggests, it constituted a broad faculty or grouping of subjects and classes that provided a core liberal syllabus in the arts and sciences available to all students of King's, including Medical students. Principal subjects included English Literature, Theology, Modern History, Classics, Modern Languages and Mathematics, but later instruction covered subjects as diverse as Geology, Law, Political Economy and Oriental Languages. The division between General Literature and Science Departments, that took place in 1888, foreshadowed the replacement of General Literature by the new Faculty of Arts in 1893. In 1904 the Department of Architecture and the Divisions of Laws and Economics were integrated into the Faculty of Arts until the Transfer Act of 1908 when the governance of King's College London was transferred to the University of London and a separate Faculty of Laws was established. The Faculty of Arts was replaced by the School of Humanities in 1989.

The Education Department, part of the Faculty of Arts became the Faculty of Education in 1968, which then merged with the Chelsea College Centre for Science and Mathematics Education in 1985 to create the School of Education.

The Class of Civil Engineering and Mining was founded at King's in 1838, mainly as a response to the growth of the railway system and the need for more qualified engineers. This became the Department of Civil Engineering and Architecture and Science, as Applied to Arts and Manufactures in 1840. Over the next few years this department enlarged in scope and in 1844 became the Department of the Applied Sciences. This became the Department of Engineering and the Applied Sciences in 1874. In 1893 the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences was created as part of the Faculty of Science. The Faculty of Engineering was created in 1902, which originally was made up of the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Separate departments of Civil Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Electronic and Electrical Engineering were formed, with Civil and Mechanical Engineering combining in 1935. Civil Engineering was then closed in 1989, whilst Mechanical Engineering and Electronic and Electrical Engineering, now the Department of Electronic Engineering, became part of the School of Physical Sciences and Engineering in 1991 and the Faculty of Natural, Mathematical and Engineering Sciences in 2019.

The Faculty of Life Sciences was established in 1985 following the merger of King's, Queen Elizabeth and Chelsea Colleges. Previously, its constituent departments had mainly formed part of the Faculty of Natural Science. The College's academic structure was reorganised into Schools in 1989, when the School of Life, Basic Medical and Health Sciences came into being. In 1998, this was subdivided into the School of Health and Life Sciences, and the School of Biomedical Sciences.