While well armed for their size, they were primarily workhorses for the overseas fleet on "police" duties and did not serve with the main battlefleet.

With reciprocating triple expansion engines and a variety of boilers, the top speed was 20 knots (37 km/h).

HMS Pandora was laid down at Portsmouth Dockyard on 3 January 1898,[1] and launched on 17 January 1900, when she was christened by Mrs. (Mary Elizabeth) Napier, daughter of Admiral Sir Michael Culme-Seymour, Commander-in-Chief at Portsmouth[2] (and herself wife of a Royal Navy officer who later became Vice-Admiral Sir Trevylyan Napier).

She was commissioned for the 1901 naval maneuvers, then carried out a series of propeller trials at Portsmouth under Commander Somerset Gough-Calthorpe, before she was paid off on 13 September 1901.

[3] On 7 November 1901 she was commissioned by Commander John Francis Murray-Aynsley to relieve HMS Melita on the Mediterranean Station,[4] and she arrived at Malta early the following month.