[2] After the successful Greater Poland uprising of 1806, it was regained by Poles and included within the short-lived Duchy of Warsaw, and in 1815 it was reannexed by Prussia, under the Germanized name Grätz.

In the Greater Poland uprising (1848) during the Revolutions of 1848 a battle was fought between the Polish insurgents and Prussian troops in the present-day district of Doktorowo.

[2] Poles took control of the town without fighting, however volunteers from Grodzisk participated in the Greater Poland uprising in other places, as well as in the Polish–Soviet War.

[2] The town was confirmed as part of Poland in the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, and was until 1932 the seat of a county or powiat.

[2] Poles were also subjected to expulsions, the first of which was carried out in November 1939,[5] nevertheless, the Polish resistance movement was active in the town.

[2] Poles from Grodzisk were among the victims of massacres perpetrated during the genocidal Intelligenzaktion campaign at Rydzyna in November 1939.

[9] Heliodor Jankiewicz, commander of the local unit of the Narodowa Organizacja Bojowa organization, was arrested by the Germans in September 1941, and then sentenced to death and executed the following year.

The officially protected traditional foods originating from Grodzisk Wielkopolski (as designated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Poland) are various meat products, including kiełbasa grodziska, a local type of kiełbasa,[11] salceson ozorowy grodziski, a local type of salceson,[4] bułczanka grodziska, a local type of bułczanka (lunch meat made of pork, wheat roll and spices),[12] and pasztetowa grodziska, a local type of pork pasztetowa (Polish liverwurst).

It plays in the lower leagues, but continues the traditions of Dyskobolia Grodzisk Wielkopolski which in the 1990s and 2000s competed in the Ekstraklasa, the country's top flight, finishing 2nd in 2003 and 2005, and also the winner of the 2007 Polish Cup.