Alanya has been home to many pirates, many feudal lords and civilizations from antiquity to the present day.

As the oldest known name, Coracesium (Gökkarga), which has taken its place in history, has been calculated to have a history of 20 thousand years as a result of the excavations and researches.

Coracesium, a peninsula that was difficult to conquer, was occupied by the pirates in ancient times and used as a robbery warehouse. In addition, the notorious pirates who lived by tying the rich and kidnapping the daughters of well-known people were attacked when the Romans made the Mediterranean unblockable.

Coracesium was conquered by the Romans in 65 BC with the Battle of Korakesion and entered the territory of the Byzantine Empire after the collapse of the Roman Empire in 395 AD. It was named as Kolonoros during the Byzantine period.

The Byzantine Empire began to collapse when the Crusader armies established the Latin Empire in Istanbul in 1204, and the Derebeyi Kyr Vart, who benefited from the authority gap in Anatolia, dominated Kolonoros.

The name of the city, which was conquered by Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I in 1221 and joined the Anatolian Seljuk lands, was changed to Alaeddin Keykubad's name. During the reign of Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I, many of his works were built during this period and used as the winter capital of the Anatolian Seljuk State. Alanya Castle was further enlarged and Alaeddin Keykubad's palace was built inside the castle. The Kızılkule and the first shipyard of the Seljuks in the Mediterranean Sea, located just below Alanya Castle, were built in this period and built at the bottom of Alarahan Castle at the Alarahan Caravanserai 35 km west of the center of Alanya.

As a result of the collapse of the Anatolian Seljuk State in 1300, the city came under the rule of the Karamanoğulları Principality. Konya-based Karamanoğulları sold the city to Egypt Mamluk Sultanate in 1427 for 5 thousand gold.

With the rise of the Ottoman Empire, Alaiye joined the Ottoman lands in 1471 by Gedik Ahmet Pasha, one of the commanders of Fatih Sultan Mehmet, without any war. Alaiye was first connected to the province of Cyprus (1571) and then entered the banner of the province of Konya (1864) and then to the province of Antalya (1868). Finally, in 1871, it became a district of Antalya.

During the War of Independence, Italian navy ships randomly threw bombs at the Kalearkası site to scare the people, but there were no deaths.

In the telegraph between Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and the mayor of the Republic, Alanya was written with a letter error instead of Alaiye and in 1933 it was published in the official newspaper and named Alanya.