[1][2] Muin-i Zafer, meaning "Aid to Triumph",[3] was ordered in 1867 from the Samuda Brothers shipyard in Cubitt Town, London.

[2] Upon completion, Muin-i Zafer and the other ironclads then being built in Britain and France were sent to Crete to assist in stabilizing the island in the aftermath of the Cretan Revolt of 1866–1869.

During this period, the Ottoman fleet, under Hobart Pasha, remained largely inactive, with training confined to reading translated British instruction manuals.

[4] Muin-i Zafer was assigned to the II Squadron of the Asiatic Fleet, along with her sister ship Avnillah and the ironclads Hifz-ur Rahman and Lütf-ü Celil.

[5] Early in the ship's career, the Ottoman ironclad fleet was activated every summer for short cruises from the Golden Horn to the Bosporus to ensure their propulsion systems were in operable condition.

In December 1876, Muin-i Zafer and her sister ship Avnillah were transferred to Batumi owing to the increasingly active Russian naval forces in the area.

[7] Muin-i Zafer spent the war in the Black Sea squadron, with the bulk of the Ottoman ironclad fleet.

Hobart Pasha took the fleet to the eastern Black Sea, where he was able to make a more aggressive use of it to support the Ottoman forces battling the Russians in the Caucasus.

[10] On 14 May 1877, an Ottoman squadron consisting of Muin-i Zafer, Avnillah, Necm-i Şevket, Feth-i Bülend, Mukaddeme-i Hayir, and Iclaliye bombarded Russian positions around the Black Sea port of Sokhumi before landing infantry and arming the local populace to start an uprising against the Russians.

[11][12] By June, Muin-i Zafer had been transferred to Sulina at the mouth of the Danube, along with the ironclads Hifz-ur Rahman and Asar-i Şevket.

At some point, she also received new Scotch marine boilers, and her brigantine rig was removed, with heavy military masts installed in its place.

The British naval attache to the Ottoman Empire at the time estimated that the Imperial Arsenal would take six months to get just five of the ironclads ready to go to sea.

During a period of tension with Greece in 1886, the fleet was brought to full crews and the ships were prepared to go to sea, but none actually left the Golden Horn, and they were quickly laid up again.

[16] At the start of the Greco-Turkish War in February 1897, the Ottomans inspected the fleet and found that almost all of the vessels, including Muin-i Zafer, to be completely unfit for combat against the Greek Navy.