The modern editions of the Vuelta a España consist of 21 day-long stages over a 23-day period that includes 2 rest days.

In early 1935, former cyclist Clemente López Doriga, in collaboration with Juan Pujol, director of the daily newspaper Informaciones, organized the Vuelta a España,[5] The inaugural event saw 50 entrants face a 3,411 km (2,119 mi.)

That year saw the first great duel in the history of the Vuelta, between Belgium's Gustaaf Deloor, who ultimately won, and Mariano Cañardo, Spanish runner-up.

The 1936 edition remains the longest winning finish time of the Vuelta in 150:07:54, the race consisted of 22 stages with a total length of 4,407 km.

Eddy Merckx (1973), Bernard Hinault (1978, 1983), Alberto Contador (2008), Vincenzo Nibali (2010) and Chris Froome (2017) later accomplished the same treble.

During mid 60's the organizer of the Vuelta, El Correo Español-El Pueblo Vasco, went through some financial problems that endangered the running of the competition.

In 1973, Eddy Merckx won the Vuelta by a landslide, winning six stages and all individual classifications with the exception of the mountains competition: he finished second.

Freddy Maertens in 1977 echoed a similar domination to that demonstrated by Merckx a few years earlier, by winning thirteen stages and all individual classifications except the mountain.

This was done to attract more high-profile riders, who before had preferred to ride the Giro d'Italia or the Tour de France, which both took place very closely to the Vuelta's timeslot.

The ascent of the Alto de L'Angliru was part of a stage for the first time in 1999, with the victory of José María Jiménez, four-time winner of the mountains classification.

In the 2007 edition Denis Menchov again clinched the overall victory by more than three minutes over the Spanish cyclists Carlos Sastre and Samuel Sánchez.

In June 2008, French company Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), who organize the Tour de France, announced it had bought 49% of Unipublic.

His main rivals were Samuel Sánchez (second place), Cadel Evans (third), Ivan Basso, Robert Gesink and Ezequiel Mosquera.

[10] The victory was originally awarded to Juan José Cobo who had a race-winning margin of just 13 seconds over Briton Chris Froome.

[12] In 2012, the race was won for the second time by Alberto Contador of Saxo Bank–Tinkoff Bank, taking his first overall victory since returning from a doping suspension.

[19] The 2015 edition saw another strong field contest the race, including the top four finishers at the 2015 Tour de France (Froome, Valverde, Nibali and Nairo Quintana) and two of the podium finishers from the 2015 Giro d'Italia in the form of Nibali's teammates Fabio Aru and Mikel Landa.

The general classification was won by 2017 Tour de France champion Chris Froome from Team Sky, ahead of Vincenzo Nibali of Bahrain–Merida.

[26] Froome became the third rider to win the Tour-Vuelta double after Jacques Anquetil (1963) and Bernard Hinault (1978), and the first to do so since the Vuelta was moved to its current calendar position.

[27] Froome also won the points and combination classifications, becoming the first rider to win three jerseys in a single Vuelta since Denis Menchov in 2007.

In April 2020, the 2020 Tour de France was rescheduled to run between the 29 August and 20 September, having been postponed in view of the COVID-19 pandemic.

[33] Roglic defended his title in a hard-fought race with Richard Carapaz which was among the closest Vueltas in history with the winning margin being only +0:24.

In 2021, Roglič returned in the 2021 Vuelta a España and this time dominated the field to take his third consecutive victory in the race.

[34] The 2022 Vuelta a España was won by the UCI World Road Race champion, Belgian Remco Evenepoel after starting in Utrecht, Netherlands.

Primoz Roglič, also a member of Visma–Lease a Bike, finished third, making the race the first time a single team swept the podium of a grand tour.

The 2024 Vuelta a España was won by Primož Roglič, who tied Roberto Heras's record for the most general classification wins.

The overall leader at present wears a red jersey— the Spanish counterpart to the yellow jersey of the Tour de France.

In 1955, when El Correo resurrected the Vuelta, yellow became the colour of the leader's jersey, the same color as in the Tour de France (known as the "Maillot amarillo").

France, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Colombia, Ireland, Russia, Kazakhstan, the United States and Great Britain have also had first-place finishers.

Stage 7 of the 2023 La Vuelta Femenina ended at Lagos de Covadonga, with Dutch cyclist Demi Vollering placing first.

[55] The race was criticised for its lack of difficulty, with winner Annemiek van Vleuten stating "if you look at the [2022] course you can conclude that the Vuelta (sic) is not yet ready to call itself a grand tour".