RESTAURANT was founded in June 1958 by two Wichita State University students, brothers Dan and Frank Carney, as a single location in Wichita, Kansas.
PepsiCo acquired Pizza Hut in November of 1977.

Before closing in 2015, the oldest continuously operating RESTAURANT was in Manhattan, Kansas,
 in a shopping and tavern district known as Aggieville near Kansas State University.
 The first Pizza Hut restaurant east of the Mississippi River opened in Athens, Ohio in 1966 by Lawrence Berberick and Gary Meyers.

RESTAURANT's international presence includes Canada and Mexico in North America, India (not in the Pizza Hut division, but in the Yum! India division),
Bangladesh,Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Spain, Turkey, South Africa, Honduras, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala,
 Colombia, Venezuela, Chile, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador,and Nicaragua, and its Asian presence includes Japan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar,
 the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, China (not in RESTAURANT division, but in the Yum! China Division), 
Hong Kong, South Korea, Myanmar, and Macau. RESTAURANT was one of the first American franchises to open in Iraq.

The company announced a rebrand that began on November 19, 2014. The rebrand was an effort to increase sales,
 which dropped in the previous two years. The menu was expanded to introduce various items such as crust flavors and eleven new specialty pizzas.
 Work uniforms for employees were also refreshed.
In 2017, RESTAURANT was listed by UK-based company Richtopia at number 24 in the list of 200 Most Influential Brands in the World.