The settlement, part of the Municipality of Minoa Pediados, Heraklion Prefecture, was named Panorama only in 1951, because of the beautiful panoramic view that it offers from its height of 540m. Until then, it was called Gournia, just like the settlement of the Late Minoan I period, also known as "Pompeii of Minoan Crete", on the Isthmus of Ierapetra. 

Both Panorama and its other two nearby settlements, Stironas and Amourgeles, were inhabited in recent times by refugees from Asia Minor, as well as people who relocated from other parts of Crete, such as Milopotamos, Rethymnon. 

Scholar Stergios Spanakis makes an interesting correlation between Panorama and its neighboring Stironas, in an attempt to interpret the name of the latter. Shepherds commonly separate male and young animals that have been weaned from dairy animals and keep them in a fenced area called “stironas”, i.e. “barren”. Thus, it seems that the settlement of Stironas was the gathering place of the non-dairy animals, while the dairy animals grazed in Panorama, which is greener.

Today Panorama follows the fate of most villages in Crete with its population constantly decreasing. However, the land is fertile and, until a few decades ago, its inhabitants prospered. The refugees brought with them their knowledge in vine cultivation and transformed their new homeland into a paradise for the sultana and rosaki grapes.