The Andrei Pervozvanny class were a pair of pre-dreadnought battleships built in the first decade of the twentieth century for the Baltic Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy.

They were conceived by the Naval Technical Committee in 1903 as an incremental development of the Borodino-class battleships with increased displacement and heavier secondary armament.

The disastrous experiences of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 and the unrest resulting from the 1905 Russian Revolution led to countless redesigns, change orders and delays in construction.

The battleships participated in the Ice Cruise of 1918, and Andrei Pervozvanny later helped to put down the Krasnaya Gorka fort mutiny of 1919.

The planned completion of the five Borodino-class battleships in 1904 would leave Russian shipbuilders with little work, so the Naval Technical Committee (NTC) organized a conference in late 1902 on the new 20-year shipbuilding program, which included money for four battleships in 1903 and 1904, a pair for the Black Sea Fleet (Evstafi class) and another pair for the Baltic Fleet.

[3] Skortsov warned about the unacceptable drag of the hull form that he was forced to use and Alexey Krylov, then chief of the Navy's ship model basin agreed, but nothing was done to improve its efficiency.

June 21] 1903 ended in an embarrassment: the NTC intended to award the contract for one of two new ships to Baltic Works, but did not even inform its master builder Sergey Ratnik about the project's existence.

At the end of July, Ratnik appealed to the NTC again, arguing that the mechanisms and systems overlooked by the designers would add 500–600 long tons (510–610 t) to the ship's weight.

August 16] 1903 the Ministry of the Navy awarded construction contracts to the Galernyi Island Shipyard (Andrei Pervozvanny) and the Baltic Works (Imperator Pavel I) in Saint Petersburg.

[6] Construction proceeded at a slow pace, frequently interrupted by redesign proposals, change orders, rework and inevitable delays.

[8] The NTC flooded Skvortsov in 1905 with a chain of conflicting and poorly formulated change orders influenced by war-time experience.

The additional armour required to cover the entire side of the design boosted its displacement to 17,151 long tons (17,426 t) as of late 1905.

It also eliminated openings in the sides of the hull such as gun embrasures and portholes, believing that they were a flooding danger if damaged or if the ship had a list.

This caused major problems with ventilation and adversely affecting their habitability, while the 120-millimetre guns had to be moved to positions above the central casemate.

Fleet commander Admiral Nikolai von Essen concurred, and by the middle of August 1914, the old lattice masts were largely gone.

The ships carried a maximum load of 1,500 long tons (1,500 t) of coal that gave 2,400 nautical miles (4,400 km; 2,800 mi) at a speed of 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph).

On one high-speed voyage to Reval (modern Tallinn), Estonia, in October during Force 3–4 weather, Imperator Pavel I's captain reported that the forecastle was covered by "a mass of water, in the form of a solid, unbroken rain of spray, flooding not only the upper deck, but also the 12- and 8-inch turrets, the lower bridge, conning tower and it even struck the 120 mm casemate deck".

[22] The powerplants of both ships performed well at the speed trials, but post-trial examination of Imperator Pavel I revealed unacceptable defects of its boilers, engine cylinders and crankshaft bearings.

The NTC had no funds to replace the defective boilers and postponed the repairs until the following year, but this did not happen as the navy committed all available financing to the dreadnought program.

Absence of proper portholes and the limited capacity of the electrical ventilation fans made living conditions unbearable, thus commissioned officers evaded transfer to the "ugly sisters" at all costs.

June 8] 1912 officers of Imperator Pavel I received first warnings of a conspiracy among the ratings, who allegedly planned an open mutiny on the night of July 24–25.

[21] A year later they made port visits to Portland, England, Cherbourg Naval Base, France, and Stavanger, Norway, in September 1913.

July 28] 1914, Imperator Pavel I, the predreadnoughts Slava and Tsesarevich and the armoured cruiser Rurik sailed out to Stockholm to intimidate the Swedes.

The diplomats called the fleet back, and Imperator Pavel I missed her chance to engage a weak German scouting flotilla operating in the same area.

In August–September the battleships actively sailed north of the Gulf of Riga, but failed to intercept the German cruisers Augsburg and Blücher that were operating in the area.

Slava and Tsesarevich returned to action in the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in 1915, but Imperator Pavel I remained moored in Helsingfors.

[34] In October 1916 the crew of Imperator Pavel I, demoralized by boredom and Bolshevik propaganda, refused to obey orders and demanded better rations and easing of service.

[39] The ratings almost completely subscribed to communism, 520 sailors of Imperator Pavel I were carrying Bolshevik party cards by the end of April.

The disorganized crew declared allegiance to the Russian Provisional Government and even sailed out for a gunnery practice on orders from Alexander Kerensky.

[42] Two months later, on the night of August 16/17, 1919, British Coastal Motor Boats attacked ships in Kronstadt harbour with torpedoes.