The West Division is one of the two regional divisions of the Canadian Football League. Although the CFL was not founded until 1958, the West Division and its clubs are descended from earlier leagues.

The first organized football club in Western Canada was the Winnipeg Rugby Football Club, later the Winnipeg Football Club, a forerunner of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers which was founded in 1879. At the time the sport was generally called rugby or rugby football because its rules were similar to rugby union's, although this would change drastically in the coming decades. The first organized competition in the West was formed in 1888 Winnipeg Football Club, St. John's College and the Royal School of Infantry formed the Manitoba Rugby League, later re-organized as the Manitoba Rugby Football Union. Football was being played in what was to become Alberta and Saskatchewan by 1890, and by 1907 the new provinces had organized their own respective competitions and agreed to adopt the rules of the national governing body, the Canadian Rugby Union. A provincial union was not formed in British Columbia until the 1920s. The four rugby unions in the West were named the Manitoba Rugby Football Union, Saskatchewan Rugby Football Union, Alberta Rugby Football Union and the British Columbia Rugby Football Union