The Hildesheim–Goslar railway is a 53 kilometre long, double-track and non-electrified main line in the northern Harz foothills in the German state of Lower Saxony.

It serves mainly to connect with the tourist region in the northern Harz (Goslar, Bad Harzburg and Wernigerode) with Hildesheim and Hanover.

Approximately at the same time, the Hanover-Altenbeken Railway Company (Hannover-Altenbekener Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft, HAE) planned a connection to the east, bypassing the cities of Hanover and Brunswick.

Freight traffic took the direct connection from Grauhof to Vienenburg, while passenger trains ran via Goslar and from 1912 also continued via Bad Harzburg and Wernigerode.

In addition, rail services slowly increased for vacationers travelling from Hamburg and Bremen via Hanover to Goslar; some of these also conveyed through coaches via Halberstadt to Berlin.

However, the northern connection from the Harz to Hanover and Hamburg, served by D-Zug expresses and later InterRegio services, remained.