Founded on 23 December 1889, they are the oldest football club in Spain, and currently play in Primera Federación – Group 2, holding home games at Estadio Nuevo Colombino, which has a 21,670 seating-capacity.

[1][2][3] Huelva thus became the home to a vast British colony, among whom a certain William Bice stood out, as he was the one who began organizing the first "kick-abouts" between the club's members, which were possibly the very first kick to a football ball on Spanish soil.

[1][4][5] The remaining five founding members were Edward Palin, Alfred Gough, Gavin Speirs, and the only two Spaniards: Pedro Nolasco de Soto and José Muñoz Pérez, both of whom had studied in Britain and thus had a great knowledge of the English language, with Nolasco having previous experience as a director of a sailing club, while Muñoz had a position within the local press.

[1] Two months later, on 8 March 1890, these two clubs played the first official football match in Spain at the Hipódromo de Tablada, which was refereed by Johnston, the president of Sevilla, who won the match 2–0; Huelva line-up the following players: William Alcock, Yates, George Wakelin, Guillermo Duclós, Coto, Kirk, Benito Daniel, Curtis, Gibbon, Geraldo Brady, and Smith.

[8][9] Following the success of the first match, the clubs decided to play a return fixture in Huelva just three weeks later, on 7 April 1890, in front of a crowd of 500, and even though Sevilla scored the opening goal via Gilbert Pollock, thus becoming the first-ever player to score an away goal on Spanish soil, Huelva managed to fight back to win 2–1, partly because they had been fortified by "some athletes from the British colony of Rio-Tinto".

[4] In that same year, Mackay and Adam formed the club's subcommittee charged with planning and supervising the works of the so-called Campo del Velódromo on the plot of land located on the Seville road opposite the Hotel Colon, which was the first sports venue built in Spain for the practice of football,[4][6] and which was inaugurated on 20 August, just in time to host the sporting events that had been organized by Recreativo in commemoration of the IV Centenary of the Discovery of America.

[6] After the departure of Edward Palin in 1891, Muñoz became the new secretary of the club, and as such, he played a key role in the organization of this event that took place between August and October 1892,[6] and whose program remains the oldest surviving original document from Recreativo, in which the club has specific and established rules for football, cricket, and tennis games, hence making them the oldest rules that had been created in Spain in relation to the practice of football.

[4][5] In March 1915 it was William Alexander Mackay himself who hand-delivered to the Minister of the Interior the letter requesting the King Alfonso VIII to accept the Honorary Presidency of the Club, and since then Recreativo has been Royal.

[18] The Huelva squad that played in this tournament included the likes of Antonio Tellechea, Tomás Estrada, Robert Geoghegham, and William Waterston.

[23] With a new stadium and the appointment of Luis Alcaraz as manager, and the club returned to the top flight for the first time in 23 years on 19 May 2002 with a 2–1 home win over fellow Andalusians Xerez CD.

Ahead of the new season, the club bought players including France youth international striker Florent Sinama Pongolle from Liverpool,[25] and young winger Santi Cazorla from Villarreal CF, with a budget of only €15 million.

[26] The club finished eighth in the table, at 54 points, a best-ever, and made headlines with a 3–0 win against Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium.

[26] The club's leading goalscorer was Sinama Pongolle with 12 goals to his name, while García Toral left at its conclusion for Racing de Santander.