The 2016 Vuelta a España was a three-week Grand Tour cycling stage race that took place in Spain between 20 August and 11 September 2016.

The race was the 71st edition of the Vuelta a España and the final Grand Tour of the 2016 cycling season.

The race included 21 stages, beginning with a team time trial that started in Ourense.

The eighteen UCI WorldTeams were automatically invited and obliged to attend the race.

The route travelled through Asturias before coming to the Basque Country; the fourteenth stage, described by Cyclingnews.com as the hardest of the race, took place mainly just across the border in France.

Stages were categorised as third-, second-, first- and special-category, with the more difficult climbs rated higher.

The rider with the lowest cumulative score was the winner of the classification and wore a white jersey.

An identical procedure took place on the final stage to decide the most combative rider of the whole Vuelta.