Designed by the government-owned FFVS (Air Board Workshop) under the leadership of Bo Lundberg, the J 22 was Sweden's most advanced fighter of World War II which nevertheless did not see active combat. As a neutral nation, Sweden was pressured by both Allies and Axis to relinquish its neutrality, refusal of which resulted in an embargo of US aircraft at a time when war raged around all of its borders. It was therefore decided to maintain the independence of its defense forces, the result of which was the J 22, a relatively simple aircraft of steel tube and wood construction but which had decent performance in addition to ease of construction which allowed it to be manufactured by as many as 500 sub-contractors most of which had no previous experience with aircraft. The J 22 was widely praised by its pilots who came to value its excellent maneuvrability and served up to 1952, a first step for an aircraft industry among the world's best.

The protoype J 22 was first flown on 21 September 1942 from an off the drawing board order placed the previous year. Variants included the J 22A which featured both 7.9-mm and 13.2-mm machine guns and the J 22B with only the larger caliber ones.