HMS Dalriada was established as a Royal Naval Reserve Headquarters Unit for Greenock and the Firth of Clyde, Scotland in 1965 and originally occupied former air defence buildings on the outskirts of Inverkip.

Dalriada remained in Inverkip until 1982, when the unit moved to the Navy Buildings in Greenock, on the site of the former gun battery at Fort Matilda.

The Ship's Badge of Dalriada has the boar's head of Clan Campbell (who occupied the territory of the ancient Dál Riata Kingdom in the High Middle Ages) with a Celtic torc and surmounted with a coronet.

The letters R N R surround the device and all is enclosed within a diamond surmounted in turn by a plaque with the ship's name and above that the Naval Crown.

In April 2013, Dalriada moved to Govan, subsuming its satellite unit and co-locating with the Royal Marines Reserve Glasgow Detachment.