His father Lorenzo Martínez de la Sagra came from a noble merchant family, which became wealthy through trade with the Spanish colonies in America.

Ramón de la Sagra studied physics for one year in Nautical School of A Coruña.

In 1839 he published Voyage en Hollande et en Belgique sous le rapport de l’instruction primaire, des établissements de bien faisance et des prisons, dans les deux pays (published in Paris, 1839 in French and in Spanish in 1844).

In 1845 he founded the world's first anarchist journal El Porvenir, which was closed by Ramón María Narváez, Duke of Galicia.

In Brussels he met Heinrich Ahrens, disciple of Krause, whose doctrines he proclaimed in Spain before Julian Sanz del Rio.

Ramón de la Sagra is commemorated in the scientific name of two species of Cuban lizards, Anolis sagrei and Diploglossus delasagra.

published Sagraea, a genus of flowering plants from the Caribbean belonging to the family Melastomataceae, and named in Ramón de la Sagra's honor.