We study the structure of the galaxy cluster Abell 523 (A523) at z = 0.104 using new spectroscopic data for 132 galaxies acquired at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo, new photometric data from the Isaac Newton Telescope, and X-ray and radio data from the Chandra and Very Large Array archives. We estimate the velocity dispersion of the galaxy population, $\sigma _{\rm V}=949_{-60}^{+80}$ km s−1, and the X-ray temperature of the hot intracluster medium, kT = 5.3 ± 0.3 keV. We infer that A523 is a massive system: M 200 ∼ 7–9 × 1014 M⊙. The analysis of the optical data confirms the presence of two subclusters, 0.75 Mpc apart, tracing the SSW-NNE direction and dominated by the two brightest cluster galaxies (BCG1 and BCG2). The X-ray surface brightness is strongly elongated towards the NNE direction, and its peak is clearly offset from both the brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs). We confirm the presence of a 1.3 Mpc large radio halo, elongated in the ESE-WNW direction and perpendicular to the optical/X-ray elongation. We detect a significant radio/X-ray offset and radio polarization, two features which might be the result of a magnetic field energy spread on large spatial scales. A523 is found consistent with most scaling relations followed by clusters hosting radio haloes, but quite peculiar in the P radio–L X relation: it is underluminous in the X-rays or overluminous in radio. A523 can be described as a binary head-on merger caught after a collision along the SSW-NNE direction. However, minor optical and radio features suggest a more complex cluster structure, with A523 forming at the crossing of two filaments along the SSW-NNE and ESE-WNW directions.