Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse served in the main fleet—the Heimatflotte (Home Fleet) and later the Hochseeflotte (High Seas Fleet)—for the first seven years of her career. She participated in several of the fleet’s training cruises and maneuvers, primarily in the North and Baltic Seas. Her peacetime career was relatively uneventful and she suffered no accidents. She was decommissioned for a major reconstruction in 1908–10, after which she was assigned to the Reserve Division with her four sister ships.
At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the battleship and her sisters were placed back in active service as the V Battle Squadron of the High Seas Fleet and tasked with coastal defense in the North Sea. They were also deployed briefly to the Baltic but saw no action. In 1915, the ships were again withdrawn from service and relegated to secondary duties. Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse was used as a depot ship in Kiel and eventually a torpedo target ship. After the war, the Treaty of Versailles radically reduced the size of the German Navy, and the vessel was sold for scrapping to a German company and broken up in 1920.
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