The Jewish cemetery occupies an area bounded by Starodąbrowska, Słoneczna and Szpitalna Streets with a gate. It belongs to the Jewish Community of Kraków.

The cemetery was founded away from the city in the village of Pogwizdów and is now located in the centre of Tarnów, about a kilometre from the Market Square. It has grown over time and covers an area of 3.2 hectares. Nothing is known about the cemetery in the 15th and first half of the 16th century, but it was in existence by 1581. The cemetery has more than 5,000 graves, the oldest of them being that of  Chaim, son of Yitzhak, from 1677. The cemetery is the burial place of many prominent personalities of Jewish society.

During the German occupation, it was the site of mass executions; between 1,500 and more than 3,000 Jews were shot there and buried in mass graves.  In addition, from 1942 onwards, the occupying forces used the sandstone gravestones to makeroads, sidewalks and foundations.  The effects of the destruction in some parts of the necropolis can be seen today, where only pedestals remain on the graves.

In 1946, Dawid Beckert erected the Holocaust Memorial on the mass grave of some 25,000 Jews exterminated in Tarnow between 1942 and 1943. A broken column from the ruins of the New Synagogue with a granite inscription plaque was used in its construction. The memorial stood behind a copy of the cemetery gate, the original of which has been in the Holocaust Museum in the United States since 1991. After the Second World War, matzevahs found in the city were systematically brought to the cemetery.

Research carried out in 2018–2019 shows that more than 11,000 people are buried in the graveyard. There are interesting tombstones from the 18th century. Alongside the traditional tombstones are graves in the more original forms of sarcophagi, tombs, truncated triangles topped with pinnacles, obelisks, columns, and architectural gravestones.  Despite the exhumations that have been carried out, it is not possible to determine exactly where all thevictims lie. Therefore, to prevent accidental destruction of burials, Jews who died after the war were buried under paths.

In 1988, the Committee for the Care of Jewish Cultural Monuments was set up to protect the cemetery from devastation. Thanks to the descendants of Tarnów Jews, several tombstones and their complexes have been restored, and new symbolic monuments and plaques have been erected. Since 2000, the cemetery has been systematically cleaned. The memorial to the murdered Jews was renovated in 2004. In 2005, a guide to the cemetery was published and a tourist trail was opened to present the history of the cemetery and the most interesting tombstones.

The cemetery underwent a comprehensive restoration between 2017 and 2019. The conservation work included tidying up the site, restoring the walkways with a paved surface, rebuilding and maintaining the old wall and restoring the metal fence, and restoring around 100 gravestones as well as the main monument. The renovation also included a funeral house with a preserved stone table for the ritual washing of the corpse, where an exhibition on the history of the cemetery, the Jews of Tarnów, and their traditions has been arranged. Lighting,benches, and information boardswere installed along the walkways,and the area was made accessible for people with disabilities. An inventory of some 5,000 surviving gravestones has been compiled, and a guidebook has been published.  A lapidary is planned on the wall from preserved pieces of matzevahs from other cemeteries.

New discoveries are constantly being made; in 2023, 100 tombstones from the 19th century were found in the part of the cemetery farthest from the entrance.