Chrono Trigger was produced by Kazuhiko Aoki and directed by Akihiko Matsui, Yoshinori Kitase and Takashi Tokita. Development supervisors included Hironobu Sakaguchi, producer and creator of the Final Fantasy series, and Yuuji Horii, director and creator of the Dragon Quest series. A fan of time travel fiction (such as the TV series Time Tunnel), Horii fostered a theme of time travel in his general outline of Chrono Trigger with input from Akira Toriyama. Masato Kato subsequently edited and completed the outline by writing the majority of the game's story, including all the events of the 12,000 B.C. era. Kato devised the system of multiple endings because he could not branch the story out to different paths. He also created ideas for double and triple Techs. Yoshinori Kitase and Takashi Tokita then wrote various subplots. The characters of Chrono Trigger were designed by Akira Toriyama, creator of the manga Dragon Ball and a longtime contributor to the Dragon Quest series. Other notable designers include Tetsuya Takahashi, the graphic director, and Yasuyuki Honne, Tetsuya Nomura, and Yusuke Naora, who worked as field graphic artists.

Early alpha versions of Chrono Trigger were demonstrated at the 1994 and 1995 V-Jump festivals in Japan. A few months prior to the game's release, Square shipped a beta version to magazine reviewers and game stores for review. An unfinished build of the game, it contains unused music tracks, locations, and other features changed or removed from the final release—such as a dungeon named Singing Mountain, and its eponymous song. The ROM image was uploaded to the internet, prompting fans to explore and document the game's differences, including two unused world map character sprites and presumed additional sprites for certain non-player characters. Rumors of a planned eighth character exist, but are wholly unsubstantiated.

Chrono Trigger used a 32-megabit cartridge with battery-backed RAM for saved games, lacking special on-cartridge coprocessors. The Japanese release of Chrono Trigger included art for the game's ending and running counts of items in the player's status menu. Developers created the North American version before adding these features to the original build, inadvertently leaving in vestiges of Chrono Trigger's early development (such as the song Singing Mountain). Hironobu Sakaguchi asked translator Ted Woolsey to localize Chrono Trigger for English audiences and gave him roughly thirty days to work. Lacking the help of a modern translation team, he memorized scenarios and looked at drafts of commercial player's guides to put dialogue in context. Woolsey later reflected that he would have preferred two-and-a-half months, and blames his rushed schedule on the prevailing attitude in Japan that games were children's toys rather than serious works. Some of his work was cut due to space constraints, though he still considered Trigger “one of the most satisfying games I ever worked on or played.” Nintendo of America censored certain dialogue, including references to breastfeeding, consumption of alcohol, and religion. ROM hackers released a literal fan translation patch and annotated script in 2007 to clarify key differences. Square shipped Trigger with two world maps, and Japanese buyers who preordered received holographic foil cards.

Chrono Trigger was scored by Yasunori Mitsuda and veteran Final Fantasy composer Nobuo Uematsu. A sound programmer at the time, Mitsuda was unhappy with his pay and threatened to leave Square if he could not compose music. Hironobu Sakaguchi suggested he score Chrono Trigger, remarking, “maybe your salary will go up.” Mitsuda reflected, “I wanted to create music that wouldn't fit into any established genre…music of an imaginary world. The game's director, Masato Kato, was my close friend, and so I'd always talk with him about the setting and the scene before going into writing.” Mitsuda slept in his studio several nights, and attributed certain songs—such as To Far Away Times—to inspiring dreams. After he contracted stomach ulcers, Uematsu joined the project to compose ten songs and finish the score. Mitsuda considers Chrono Trigger a landmark title which helped mature his talent. At the time of the game's release, the number of tracks and sound effects was unprecedented—the soundtrack spanned three discs in its 1995 commercial pressing. Square also released a one-disc acid jazz arrangement called “The Brink of Time” by Guido that year. In 1999, Square produced another one-disc soundtrack to complement the PlayStation release of Trigger, featuring orchestral tracks used in cut scenes. Yasunori Mitsuda also composed four new pieces for the game's bonus features which weren't included on the soundtrack. Recently, Mitsuda arranged versions of music from the Chrono series for Play! video game music concerts, presenting the main theme, Frog's Theme, and To Far Away Times.

Chrono Trigger sold more than 2.36 million copies in Japan and 290,000 abroad. The first two million copies sold in Japan were delivered in only two months. The game was met with substantial success upon release in North America, and its rerelease on the PlayStation as part of the Final Fantasy Chronicles package topped the NPD TRSTS PlayStation sales charts for over six weeks. This version was later re-released again in 2003 as part of Sony's Greatest Hits line. Chrono Trigger has recently placed highly on all five of multimedia website IGN's “top 100 games of all time” lists—4th in 2002, 6th in early 2005, 13th in late 2005, 2nd in 2006, and 18th in 2007. GameSpot included Chrono Trigger in “The Greatest Games of All Time” list released in April 2006, and it also appeared as 28th on an “All Time Top 100” list in a poll conducted by Japanese magazine Famitsu. In 2004, Chrono Trigger finished runner up to Final Fantasy VII in the inaugural GameFAQs video game battle.

Chrono Trigger garnered much critical praise in addition to its brisk sales. Nintendo Power called it Square's “biggest game ever”, citing improved graphics, sound, and gameplay over past RPG titles. Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine described Trigger as “original and extremely captivating”, singling out its graphics, sound and story as particularly impressive. IGN commented that “it may be filled with every imaginable console RPG cliché, but Chrono Trigger manages to stand out among the pack” with “a [captivating] story that doesn't take itself too serious (sic)” and “one of the best videogame soundtracks ever produced.” Other reviewers (such as the staff of RPGFan and RPGamer) have criticized the game's short length and relative ease compared to its peers. Overall, critics lauded Chrono Trigger for its “fantastic yet not overly complex” story, simple but innovative gameplay, and high replay value afforded by multiple endings.

Square released an enhanced port of Chrono Trigger developed by TOSE in Japan for the Sony PlayStation in 1999. Square timed its release before that of Chrono Cross, the 1999 sequel to Trigger, to give new players familiarity with the story of its predecessor. This version included anime cut scenes created by original character designer Akira Toriyama's Bird Studio and animated by Toei Animation, as well as several bonus features, accessible after achieving various endings in the game. Scenarist Masato Kato attended planning meetings at Bird Studio to discuss how the ending cut scenes would illustrate subtle ties to Chrono Cross. The port was later released in North America in 2001—along with a remastered version of Final Fantasy IV—under the package title Final Fantasy Chronicles. Reviewers criticized Chronicles for lengthy load times and an absence of new in-game features. Whether Chrono Trigger will appear on the Wii's Virtual Console depends on the settlement of certain copyright issues.

There have been two notable attempts by Chrono Trigger fans to unofficially remake parts of the game for PC with a 3D graphics engine. Chrono Resurrection, an attempt at remaking ten small interactive cut scenes from Trigger, and Chrono Trigger Remake Project, which sought to remake the entire game, were forcibly terminated by Square Enix by way of a cease and desist order. Since then, fans have created a few ROM hacks.

Chrono Trigger inspired several sequels and spin-offs; the first were three titles released for the Satellaview in 1995. They included Chrono Trigger: Jet Bike Special, a racing game based on a minigame from the original; Chrono Trigger: Character Library, featuring profiles on characters and monsters from the game; and Chrono Trigger: Music Library, a collection of music from the game's soundtrack. The contents of Character Library and Music Library were later included as extras in the PlayStation rerelease of Chrono Trigger. Production I.G created a 16-minute OVA entitled “Nuumamonja: Time and Space Adventures” broadcasted at the Japanese V-Jump Festival of July 31, 1996.

Square released a fourth Satellaview game in 1996, named Radical Dreamers: Nusumenai Hōseki. Feeling that Trigger ended with “unfinished business”, scenarist Masato Kato wrote and directed the game. Dreamers functioned as a side story to Chrono Trigger, resolving a loose subplot from its predecessor. A short, text-based game relying on minimal graphics and atmospheric music, the game never received an official release outside Japan—though it was translated by fans to English in April 2003. Square planned to release Radical Dreamers as an easter egg in the PlayStation edition of Chrono Trigger, but Kato was unhappy with his work and halted its inclusion.

Square released Chrono Cross for the Sony PlayStation in 1999. Cross is a sequel to Chrono Trigger featuring a new setting and cast of characters. Presenting a theme of parallel worlds, the story followed the protagonist Serge—a teenage boy thrust into an alternate reality in which he died years earlier. With the help of a thief named Kid, Serge endeavors to discover the truth behind his apparent death and obtain the Frozen Flame, a mythical artifact. Regarded by writer and director Masato Kato as an effort to “redo Radical Dreamers properly”, Chrono Cross borrowed certain themes, scenarios, characters, and settings from Dreamers. Yasunori Mitsuda also adapted certain songs from Radical Dreamers while scoring Cross. Radical Dreamers was consequently removed from the series' main continuity, considered an alternate dimension. Chrono Cross sold 1.5 million copies and was universally praised by critics.

There are no plans for a new title, despite a statement from Hironobu Sakaguchi in 2001 that the developers of Chrono Cross wanted to make a new Chrono game. The same year, Square applied for a trademark for the names Chrono Break in the United States and Chrono Brake in Japan. However, the United States trademark was dropped in 2003. Director Takashi Tokita mentioned “Chrono Trigger 2” in a 2003 interview which has not been translated to English. Yuji Horii expressed no interest in returning to the Chrono franchise in 2005, while Hironobu Sakaguchi remarked in April 2007 that his creation Blue Dragon was an “extension of [Chrono Trigger].” During a Cubed³ interview on February 1, 2007, Square Enix’s Senior Vice President Hiromichi Tanaka said that although no sequel is currently planned, some sort of sequel is still possible if the Chrono Cross developers can be reunited. Yasunori Mitsuda has expressed interest in scoring a new game, but warned that “there are a lot of politics involved” with the series. He stressed that Masato Kato should participate in development.