Until the end of the 17th century, Rastatt held little influence, but after its destruction by the French in 1689, it was rebuilt on a larger scale by Louis William, Margrave of Baden, the Imperial General in the Great Turkish War known popularly as Türkenlouis.

[3] The Baden revolution of 1849 began with a mutiny of soldiers at Rastatt in May 1849 under Ludwik Mieroslawski and Gustav Struve, and ended there a few weeks later with the capture of the town by the Prussians.

For some years, Rastatt was one of the strongest fortresses of the German empire, but its fortifications were dismantled in 1890.

Between 1946 and 1954, about twenty major criminal proceedings (known as the Rastatt Trials) for crimes against foreign workers and prisoners in smaller camps in the National Socialist camp system in south-west Germany took place in front of the French Military Administration's Tribunal Général on the basis of Control Council Law No.

Rastatt is twinned with:[8] The plot of the historical novel The Lenz Papers by Stefan Heym (published London 1964) is set in 1849 Rastatt, during the failed revolutions in Germany in 1848.