Located on the shore of Holdfast Bay in Gulf St Vincent, it has become a tourist destination due to its beach and many attractions, home to several hotels and dozens of restaurants.

Prior to the 1836 British colonisation of South Australia, Glenelg and the rest of the Adelaide Plains was home to the Kaurna group of Aboriginal Australians.

Several locations for the settlement were considered, including Kangaroo Island, Port Lincoln and Encounter Bay.

The Adelaide plains were chosen by Colonel William Light, and Governor John Hindmarsh proclaimed the province of South Australia at the site of The Old Gum Tree in Glenelg North on 28 December 1836.

[7] The first post office in Glenelg opened on 5 December 1849; the first postmaster was John McDonald of the St Leonard's Inn.

A lighthouse was built in 1872 at the jetty's end, but a year later it caught fire and was cast into the sea to save the rest of the structure.

Other additions included public baths, an aquarium, a police shed and a three-story kiosk with tea rooms.

[21] An ill-fated breakwater construction project was conceived in the early 1900s, intended to create an artificial harbour for the protection of yachts and the local fishing fleet.

It featured water slides, mini-golf, bumper boats, dodgem cars and many other amusements and was popular with many Adelaide residents.

It was also extensively criticised, called an eyesore and likened to a "giant dog dropping" in the media; despite this it was very popular with young children and teenagers.

[31] As part of the Holdfast Shores development, Magic Mountain was finally demolished in 2004 and replaced with The Beachouse, a 5-storey modern centre with a more conservative design which still incorporates the historic carousel; it opened in mid-2006.

A pipeline pumps 2.8 gigalitres of treated wastewater to Adelaide where it is used to irrigate green spaces, such as parks and ovals.

The fourteen-story tower featured a revolving restaurant on its top floor, and was part of a larger development plan that never eventuated.

The development was met with strong opposition, from both local residents and the City of Holdfast Bay, fearing overdevelopment would ruin the area.

Glenelg is a predominantly Christian community, with common affiliations, in descending order, Catholic, Anglican, no religion and Uniting.

[40] The wide beach is popular with visitors and locals alike, and tourists to Adelaide often visit Glenelg.

To the north is the mouth of the Patawalonga River, which has been dammed to create an artificial lake which is used as a boat harbour, with a lock down to the sea.

A replica of HMS Buffalo was constructed in 1980[41] on the shore of the Patawalonga, with the appearance of being moored in the artificial lake, with a restaurant operating on it.

[43] Glenelg is home to a team in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL), the Glenelg Tigers, and the Glenelg Seahorses in the South Australian Grade Cricket League In late 2020, The Nature Conservancy used a large barge to scatter several hundred tonnes of stone across the sea floor about 1 km (0.62 mi) offshore, to create 2 ha (4.9 acres) of substrate for a new oyster reef for the native angasi oyster, which had been nearly eliminated in Australian waters by over-harvesting and dredging during the 19th and early 20th centuries.

[51] Federally, Glenelg is in the Division of Boothby and has been held by Louise Miller-Frost of the Australian Labor Party since the 2022 election.