It oversees the Austrian embassies, consular representatives and other emissaries, and administers the naturalisation process and handles citizenship questions along with the Interior Ministry.

The ministry is also concerned with economic integration, European Union law, the Austrian relations to Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), as well as development aid.

The year 1720 is considered to be the origin of an independent Austrian diplomatic service, which was when Emperor Charles VI assigned the administration of foreign relations of the Habsburg monarchy to a separate minister.

For about 200 years, the external relations of the Austrian Empire proclaimed in 1804 and succeeding Austria-Hungary remained the monarch's prerogative and his assigned minister not accountable to the Imperial Council nor the Diet of Hungary.

In 1882 Foreign Minister Count Gustav Kálnoky forged the Triple Alliance with the German Empire and the Kingdom of Italy, which, however, could not arrest the proceeding Austrian isolation nor internal nationalist unrest.