Completed in 1934, she was assigned to the Coastal Fleet and also served as a training ship for naval cadets in foreign waters until the beginning of World War II in 1939.

After the war ended in 1945, she became a dedicated training ship and resumed making lengthy foreign cruises with cadets.

The committee delivered its conclusions in December 1926 which included a seaplane carrier armed with six 152-millimetre (6 in) guns in single mounts with room for twelve aircraft in a hangar.

[2] The Naval Construction Board decided that it wanted the ship to be able to function as a cruiser as well as operating as a seaplane carrier.

[1] The resulting 5,000-long-ton (5,100 t) design presented in January 1927 proved impossible to build within the available budget of Sk16.5 million that had been approved by the Riksdag on 13 May.

The engines were rated at a total of 33,000 shaft horsepower (25,000 kW) designed to give her a speed of 27.5 knots (50.9 km/h; 31.6 mph).

[6] Gotland carried up to 800 long tons (810 t) of fuel oil that gave her a range of 4,000 nautical miles (7,400 km; 4,600 mi) at a speed of 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph).

Targeting data for the guns was collected by 6-metre (19 ft 8 in) rangefinders in the fire-control director on the roof of the bridge and in the aft turret.

Gotland was fitted with two triple rotating mounts for 533 mm torpedo tubes abreast the aft funnel.

[13] The ship made her first foreign voyage from 8 December 1935 to 15 March 1936, visiting Germany, Spain, Portugal, Britain and the Netherlands.

Subsequent trips, sometimes running as long as November to April, visited ports in French West Africa, South America, the Caribbean, and Norway.

The cruiser's last foreign tour before the beginning of World War II in September 1939 was a short one in June-July of that year during which the ship made port visits in France, Britain and Norway.

[6][15] When the Germans invaded Norway and Denmark (Operation Weserübung) on 9 April 1940, the ship was being overhauled in the Naval Shipyard in Stockholm.

[20] In May 1941 one of Gotland's Ospreys sighted the German battleship Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen during a gunnery training exercise when they broke out of the Kattegat between Denmark and Norway.

In addition to the pre-war destinations, she also visited various ports in the Mediterranean, British Kenya, South Africa and North America.

Escorted by the destroyers Mode and Munin, Gotland made a trip to France and the United Kingdom from 29 April to 11 June 1947 where they visited Le Havre, Lyme Bay, Torquay, Glasgow and Oban.

The cruiser and the destroyers Norrköping and Karlskrona escorted a group of minesweepers to Tønsberg, Norway, and Antwerp, Belgium, from 24 May to 12 June 1953.