From 1378 to 1705 Celle was the official residence of the Lüneburg branch of the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg (House of Welf), who had been banished from their original ducal seat by its townsfolk.

The Celle weather station has recorded the following extreme values:[4] The town of Celle has the following 17 boroughs or Stadtteile, some of which were previously independent villages (population as at 1 January 2005): Altencelle (4,998), Altenhagen (922), Blumlage/Altstadt (8,526), Bostel (455), Boye (832), Garßen (2,978), Groß Hehlen (2,773), Hehlentor (7,974), Hustedt (736), Klein Hehlen (5,782), Lachtehausen (639), Neuenhäusen (8,082), Neustadt/Heese (10,887), Scheuen (1,165), Vorwerk (2,842), Westercelle (7,183) and Wietzenbruch (4,805).

By way of compensation for the loss of its status as a Residenz town numerous administrative institutions were established in Celle, such as the Higher Court of Appeal (Oberappellationsgericht), the prison and the State Stud Farm.

After being extended in 1913 and partially rebuilt after a fire in 1936, it was renamed Goodwood Barracks in 1945 and from 1976 to 1996 was the headquarters of Panzerbrigade 33 in the German armed forces, the Bundeswehr.

Today the New Town Hall (Neue Rathaus) and Celle Council Offices are housed in the restored brick building.

A subsidiary founded in 1936, the Mitteldeutsche Spinnhütte AG, led war preparations through its branches in the central German towns of Apolda, Plauen, Osterode, Pirna and Wanfried.

[12] During World War I, Germany operated two prisoner-of-war camps in Celle, and among its prisoners were British, Polish, Romanian, French, Belgian and Russian POWs and civilians.

During Kristallnacht, the anti-Jewish pogrom in Nazi Germany on 9/10 November 1938, the synagogue in Celle was saved from complete destruction only because it was in a very narrow lane and there would have been a risk to the adjacent leather factory and other parts of the historical city centre with its old wooden houses.

Celle was spared from further destruction by surrendering without a fight to advancing allied troops on 12 April 1945, so that the historical city centre and the castle survived the war completely unscathed.

The British Army barracks, which as Celle Station formed part of Bergen-Hohne Garrison, were handed over to the German authorities on 5 November 2012.

After the war Celle applied, along with Bonn and Frankfurt, to become the seat for the Parliamentary Council (Parlamentarischer Rat), the immediate post-war governmental body in Germany, later superseded by the West German Bundestag.

This was initially blamed on the Red Army Faction, but was later revealed to have been perpetrated by Lower Saxony's intelligence service, the Verfassungsschutz.

Shortly after the Second World War the many refugees and displaced persons from Eastern Europe led to a steep rise in the number of inhabitants within just a few months from around 17,000 to 55,000 by December 1945.

For Lower Saxony State Parliament (Landtag) elections Celle forms the constituency of Celle-Stadt with its surrounding area.

Originally it was a small gothic chapel built in 1380, but it was enlarged from 1675 to 1698 and transformed into a baroque church with impressive stucco ornaments.

On the corner of Emigrantenstraße, another historical street which was laid out for Austrian refugees at the beginning of the 18th century, Neuhäuser Kirche, a Lutheran church was founded in 1710.

Celle has a synagogue built in 1740, one of the few that survived the Nazi pogrom night of 1938, thanks to its location in a narrow street of wooden half-timber houses next to an important leather factory that would have been collaterally damaged.

The Bomann Museum opposite the castle has works by the artist Eberhard Schlotter and has exhibitions of local folklore and town history.

The picturesque French Garden lies immediately south of the Altstadt and is where the Lower Saxon Institute of Apiculture may be found.

The CD-Kaserne ("Cambridge Dragoons (CD) Barracks") is a municipal youth and cultural centre with exhibition rooms covering the subject areas of music, film, art and society.

This was originally organised by the Celle branch of the German Alpine Club (Deutscher Alpenverein), but for several years has been run by SV Altencelle.

Tourism is a large contributor to Celle's economy, especially in the summer months during jazz, wine, and other festivals, which attract thousands of visitors.

The town is not really known for heavy industry, but many businesses which have started up in Celle and some, such as Rosa Graf Cosmetics, have reached the world market.

In addition there an ink manufacturer (formerly Hostmann-Steinberg now hubergroup), paper factory (Werner Achilles Glanzfolien-Kaschieranstalt) and musical instruments makers (including Moeck).

Celle is also known as a town of civil servants, due to the large number of government officials and lawyers who work there providing important administrative and judicial services to the region.

The East Hanoverian Railways (Osthannoversche Eisenbahnen or OHE) is a goods and passenger transport company covering the north German area with its headquarters in Celle.

The section between Celle and Großburgwedel was built in the 1920s as a high-speed line for testing and record journeys across the heath-like, so-called Wietzenbruch.

The East Hanoverian Railways run goods trains on several branch lines in the Celle area, including those to Wittingen, Soltau and Munster.

In former centuries Celle was an important transhipment station for ships between Brunswick and the ports in Bremen via Oker, Aller and the (Lower) Weser.

Since 2003 Celle has been the location for the private College of Economics (Fachhochschule der Wirtschaft or FHDW), which offers courses of studies in mechatronics and the Bachelor of Business Administration.