She spent much of her early career as flagship for various foreign stations before returning home in 1913 to be assigned to the reserve Third Fleet.

She was powered by two 4-cylinder triple-expansion steam engines, each driving one shaft, which produced a total of 10,000 indicated horsepower (7,500 kW) designed to give a maximum speed of 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph).

[7] She was completed on 5 October 1899,[1] and commissioned for service on the North America and West Indies Station by Captain Frank Hannam Henderson.

She visited Bermuda and the West Indies in January 1900,[8] and two months later arrived in Nassau, Bahamas with her shaft broken and boilers damaged.

The work was undertaken by Harland & Wolff at Belfast, where she arrived from Devonport in May 1902, in tow of the special service vessel HMS Traveller.

Hermes returned home in March 1913 and was reduced to reserve as part of the Nore Command the next month.

[12] Work began to modify her to accommodate three seaplanes in April to evaluate the use of aircraft in support of the fleet.

A canvas hangar was fitted at the aft end of the rails to shelter the aircraft from the weather and a derrick was rigged from the foremast to lift the seaplane from the water.

Three storage lockers were fitted with a total capacity of 2,000 imperial gallons (9,100 L; 2,400 US gal) of petrol in tins.

During the manoeuvers, she simulated a reconnaissance Zeppelin for the Red Fleet, commanded by Vice Admiral John Jellicoe.

[20] In January 2017, two English divers were charged with failing to declare items removed from the wreck of Hermes, in contravention of the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986.