He was the second son of Prince Ludwig Ferdinand of Bavaria and his wife Infanta María de la Paz of Spain.

With the outbreak of World War II, Adalbert was recalled back to the military and served as a staff officer under close family friend Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb.

By this decree, Hitler ordered that all members of the former German reigning royal houses were forbidden from joining or participating in any military operations in the Wehrmacht.

Later, in May 1941, Prince Adalbert was cashiered from the military and withdrew to the family castle Hohenschwangau in southern Bavaria, where he lived for the rest of the war.

After the war he worked shortly for the Bavarian Red Cross office and in 1952 was appointed by Konrad Adenauer as the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Spain.