In addition to the Krupp steel, the ships also adopted several other changes, including water-tube boilers, in-line funnels, and a full-length armoured belt.

In 1905, with the signing of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, the Royal Navy withdrew most of its heavy units from the Far East, and the six Canopus-class ships returned to British waters, seeing further service with the Home, Channel, and the Atlantic Fleets through 1908.

Canopus participated in the hunt for the German East Asia Squadron, which culminated in the Battle of the Falkland Islands in December 1914.

Glory served as the flagship of the British North Russia Squadron, while Vengeance took part in operations off German East Africa in 1916.

Two days later, White relayed the parameters for the ships to his staff, along with instructions to prepare a suitable design as quickly as possible.

The three variants were submitted to the Admiralty in early October; on the 9th, the Board sent its reply to White, instructing him to prepare a new design that combined the armour layout of "A" and "B" with the secondary battery of "B".

By this time, the Board had decided to adopt new water-tube boilers after they had been successfully tested aboard the torpedo gunboat Sharpshooter.

These reductions were used to increase the thickness of the forward strake and the main deck and to place four of the secondary guns in armoured casemates.

Though the armour scheme was not as weak as it appeared on paper, the Royal Navy was not pleased with the reduction in defensive power.

Nevertheless, they matched the Fujis they were intended to counter, and they represented the maximum offensive and defensive capabilities possible on the displacement and draught restrictions imposed by the Admiralty.

The Canopuses were able to reach 5,320 mi (8,560 km) at an economical cruising speed of 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph) with a full load of coal.

The inward-turning screws also caused problems in service, as they made steering difficult at low speed or when steaming in reverse; the arrangement proved to be unpopular with crews as a result.

Regardless, the Royal Navy retained inward-turning screws in all future pre-dreadnought battleships, before returning to outward-turning propellers for Dreadnought in 1906.

[11] As was customary for battleships of the period, they were also equipped with four 18-inch (457 mm) torpedo tubes submerged in the hull,[5] two on each broadside near the forward and aft barbette.

Though it was thinner, it was more comprehensive; the Canopus class was the first British capital ship to return to a full-length armoured belt since Dreadnought, launched in 1875.

The French did not place howitzers on any of their new ships, but the adoption of two armour decks was continued in British practice until the Nelson-class battleships of the 1920s.

White publicly defended the design, pointing out that recent experience between Chinese and Japanese warships at the Battle of the Yalu River demonstrated that armour proved to be more effective in protecting ships than proving ground tests would indicate, and the advances in armour technology warranted the reduction in service of saving weight for better weapons.

The Anglo-Japanese Alliance signed in 1905 allowed Britain to withdraw much of her East Asian naval strength, and the Canopus-class ships were recalled to European waters.

Several of the ships, including Canopus and Glory were reduced to reserve status on their return to Britain, where they remained until the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914.

Moored at Port Stanley as a defensive battery, she fired the first shots of the Battle of the Falklands in December, which led Spee to break off the attack before being chased down and destroyed by Admiral Doveton Sturdee's battlecruisers.

Goliath initially served as a guard ship in Loch Ewe, one of the harbors used by the Grand Fleet, before escorting the crossing of British troops to Belgium in late August.

In late 1914, Ocean participated in an attack on Basra before being transferred to Egypt to defend the Suez Canal, where she joined Vengeance, which had been there since November.

They participated in major attacks on the Ottoman coastal fortifications defending the Dardanelles in March 1915, but the British and French fleets proved incapable of forcing the straits.

Allied infantry landed in April, beginning the Gallipoli campaign, and Canopus continued to bombard Ottoman positions to support them.

In June 1915, Glory was reassigned to the Mediterranean to join her sisters in the campaign, though she saw little action during that time, as her crew was needed ashore to support the troops fighting on the peninsula.

After the Gallipoli campaign ended with the withdrawal of Allied forces in January 1916, Canopus patrolled the eastern Mediterranean, but saw no further action.

In August 1916, Glory was sent to Murmansk, Russia, to support Britain's ally by keeping the vital port open for supplies being sent for the Eastern Front.

Glory returned to Britain in 1919, was decommissioned, and was renamed HMS Crescent in 1920, before ultimately being sold to ship breakers in December 1922.