Named after the Italian city of Zara (now Zadar, Croatia), the ship was built at the Odero-Terni-Orlando shipyard beginning with her keel laying in July 1928, launching in April 1930, and commissioning in October 1931.

Armed with a main battery of eight 8-inch (200 mm) guns, she was nominally within the 10,000-long-ton (10,000 t) limit imposed by the Washington Naval Treaty, though in reality she significantly exceeded this figure.

Zara saw extensive service during the first two years of Italy's participation in World War II, having taken part in several sorties to catch British convoys in the Mediterranean as the flagship of the 1st Division.

She carried a pair of IMAM Ro.43 seaplanes for aerial reconnaissance; the hangar was located in under the forecastle and a fixed catapult was mounted on the centerline at the bow.

[1] Zara's keel was laid down on 4 July 1928 at the Odero-Terni-Orlando (OTO) shipyard at Muggiano, La Spezia; she was launched on 27 April 1930, and her construction was completed on 20 October 1931, when she was commissioned into active service.

[3] During sea trials, Zara reached a speed of 35.23 kn (65.25 km/h; 40.54 mph), but this was with the ship's machinery forced to give 120,690 shp (90,000 kW).

[6] In August 1932, Zara took part in fleet training exercises in the Gulf of Naples; King Victor Emmanuel III came aboard the ship on the 13th.

Zara participated in another review on 27 November 1936, and Victor Emmanuel III, his son Umberto, Prince of Piedmont, Mussolini, and the Regent of Hungary, Miklós Horthy, all came aboard the ship.

[6] On 7 March 1939, Zara and her sister ships sortied from Taranto to intercept a squadron of Republican warships—three cruisers and eight destroyers—attempting to reach the Black Sea.

[6] At Italy's entrance into the Second World War on 10 June 1940, Zara was assigned to the 1st Division of the 1st Squadron, as the flagship of Rear Admiral Matteucci.

On 30 July, the 1st Division escorted a convoy to Benghazi and Tripoli in Italian Libya, arriving back in Augusta on 1 August.

On the 31st, the 1st Division sortied to intercept the British convoys in Operation Hats, though the Italian fleet broke off the attack without encountering the merchant ships.

British bombing of the port four days later forced the Italians to again relocate the cruisers, sending them first to La Maddalena in Sardinia on 15 December and then back to Naples on the 19th.

[6] The Italian fleet made another attempt to intercept a British convoy in the eastern Mediterranean south of Crete in late March.

[9] A second British airstrike later on the 28th failed to locate the retiring Vittorio Veneto and instead scored a single torpedo strike on Pola, hitting her amidships on her starboard side.

[10] The damage filled three compartments with water and disabled five of her boilers and the main steam line that fed the turbines, leaving her immobilized.

Lookouts on the crippled Italian cruiser spotted shapes approaching and assumed them to be friendly vessels, so they fired a red flare to guide them.