Set in Los Angeles, California, the show centers around the Forrester family and their fashion house business Forrester Creations. The program features an ensemble cast, headed by its longest-serving actors Susan Flannery as Stephanie Forrester, John McCook as Eric Forrester, Katherine Kelly Lang as Brooke Logan, Ronn Moss as Ridge Forrester also known as the core four. B&B is also a sister show to the Bells' other soap opera The Young and the Restless, as several characters from each of the two shows have crossed over to the other since the early 1990s.

Since its premiere on March 23, 1987, the show has become the most-watched soap in the world with an audience of an estimated 26.2 million viewers. As of 2010, it continues to hold on to the second placed position in weekly Nielsen Ratings for daytime dramas. B&B has also won thirty-one Daytime Emmy Awards, including one for Outstanding Drama Series in 2009 and again in 2010.

Stephanie Douglas, a strong-willed woman, daughter to a rich family, met her husband-to-be Eric Forrester, who aspired to become a fashion designer, while they both studied at Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois. The young lovers hurried to get married after Stephanie became pregnant. They moved to Los Angeles, California, where they established Forrester Creations, designing and producing upscale men and women's fashion, based on Eric's designing talent and Stephanie's financial funding. While winning international recognition, fame, and wealth with their work, the couple managed to raise four children in a happy and caring environment, including elder son Ridge, brother Thorne and younger sisters Kristen and Felicia. It was discovered years later, when the children were all adults, that Stephanie's(Stephanie Forrester) elder son, Ridge, was actually the biological child of Massimo Marone.

The pilot episodes of the show focused on the preparations of the wedding of the Forrester's eldest son, Ridge, to Caroline Spencer, the daughter of the media mogul Bill Spencer. At this time Ridge has already become a fashion designer and vice president of Forrester Creations. Many media outlets throughout the world, from the big television networks to the most honorable newspapers, to the last gossip newspapers publicize their wedding, declaring it as "the wedding of the year in the fashion world." Thousands of women see the pictures of Ridge in the newspapers and speculate on the identity of the woman who has won the heart of the man who has, until recently, been a playboy, and who has refused to settle for one woman.

One of these women is a chemistry student named Brooke Logan, who comes from a working class family and who lives with her single mother Beth, her siblings Storm, Donna and Katie at a typical American home at the San Fernando Valley in the city of Los Angeles. In an ironic twist of fate, Beth was Eric's college girlfriend before he married Stephanie. Brooke's life soon became a key element in the series. Originally from a middle-class background, her love affair with Ridge set up much of the storyline beginning in the first year. Every so often, Ridge and Brooke reunite only to break up due to circumstances, and Ridge invariably finds comfort (in most cases, this would lead to marriage) with another love of his life Dr. Taylor Hayes. In addition, the rivalry between Ridge's mother Stephanie and Brooke has played a key role in the drama since its inception. Following one of her breakups with Ridge, Brooke married his father Eric, who divorced Stephanie to do so. Brooke gave birth to two of Eric's children. They eventually divorced and Eric reconciled with Stephanie. Likewise, Brooke and Ridge resumed their pattern of an on-again-off-again relationship, in-between Brooke's relationships with other men and Forrester family members, and Ridge's multiple reunions with Taylor.

For many years Spectra Fashions was Forrester's main rival, headed by Sally Spectra. Sally, a larger-than-life character with outrageous clothes and a sizable red coiffure, helmed both comedic and dramatic storylines, with the help of ditzy receptionist Darla Einstein and fashion designer Clarke Garrison. Though at first Sally and Stephanie Forrester were bitter enemies, in later years they developed a friendship; Sally even went to work at Forrester Creations after she finally made the decision to shut down her own company.

Sally's daughter Macy Alexander, a singer, underwent many traumas, most notably alcoholism. Having an on-again-off-again marriage to Thorne Forrester, whom she eventually lost to Brooke, Macy went abroad into hiding with her father Adam. After being discovered in Italy, Macy relocated back to Los Angeles where she reunited with Thorne Forrester before developing an interest in fellow recovering alcoholic, Deacon Sharpe, whom she married. Weeks later, Macy was gravely injured at a nightclub where she was headlining as a singer. She went into a coma and it was implied that her family pulled the plug off-camera.

In recent years, the Spectra family and friends have been supplanted by the introduction of Massimo Marone and his entourage. Marone, a billionaire shipping magnate who was a childhood friend of Stephanie dated her in college. They slept together once just before Stephanie first slept with Eric Forrester, and after forty-something years, a medical crisis revealed Massimo was Ridge's biological father. Shortly thereafter, Jacqueline Payne, a former lover of Massimo, arrived on scene and announced that her son, Dominick "Nick" Payne, a captain at Marone Industries, was also fathered by Massimo. Unlike Ridge, Nick wasn't a businessman and also changed his name to Marone.

The theme song of B&B, "High Upon This Love," was written by Jack Allocco and David Kurtz. A saxophone is played by well known saxophonist Eric Marienthal. From November 1998 to July 1999 in the United States, a vocal version of the theme song performed by Dionne Warwick was played during the end credits.

The title sequence for the first seventeen years was designed by Wayne Fitzgerald. It featured still photos of the show's current cast members interspersed with photos from fashion shoots. The sequence ends with a spool of pink fabric unrolling while the title "THE BOLD AND THE BEAUTIFUL" in black 1920s style Huxley Vertical font zooms out the white area revealed by the roll (with the letters being from in a disarranged to a rearranged order). The theme tune was tweaked slightly through the years, and the cast photos were replaced occasionally. However in spite of John McCook, Susan Flanery, Katherine Kelly Lang, and Ross Moss's noticeable aging, their original 1987 photos continued to be used in the original opening titles.