The Bismarck-class corvettes were ordered as part of a major naval construction program in the early 1870s, and she was designed to serve as a fleet scout and on extended tours in Germany's colonial empire.

She was armed with a battery of twelve 15 cm (5.9 in) guns and had a full ship rig to supplement her steam engine on long cruises abroad.

Her training duties frequently involved long-distance overseas cruises, typically either to the Mediterranean Sea or the West Indies and South America.

On these cruises, Stein and other training ships visited foreign ports and responded to problems that arose involving German nationals abroad.

Stein and her sister ships were intended to patrol Germany's colonial empire and safeguard German economic interests around the world.

After exchanging crews, she began the voyage back to Germany on 10 November and arrived in Wilhelmshaven on 6 January 1884, where she was decommissioned eleven days later.

[6] The German navy generally deactivated its ships over the winter months, but a series of accidents during the summer maneuvers convinced the naval command to form a training squadron after the conclusion of the exercises on 23 September.

They stopped in Cape Verde on 13 November, where they remained for two weeks owing to tensions with Spain over the Caroline Islands and the departure of the German East Africa Squadron.

The Training Squadron was reformed on 19 July, with Stein again the flagship; she and Moltke were joined by the corvettes Sophie and Prinz Adalbert and the ironclad Hansa.

Tensions with France forced the squadron to return home prematurely on 3 February 1887, and they used a route to the north of Great Britain to avoid contact with French warships.

After completing periodic maintenance to the ships, the Training Squadron was again reformed under the command of KAdm Philipp von Kall with Stein as flagship and also including her sister Gneisenau, Moltke, and Prinz Adalbert.

She and Gneisenau took part in the Cowes Regatta in late July and early August in company with Wilhelm II aboard his yacht, Hohenzollern.

[9] Stein took part in the autumn maneuvers from 28 August to 23 September, followed by the winter training cruise, which again went to the West Indies and concluded in Kiel on 27 March 1894.

While in La Guaira, Venezuela in December 1893, Stein represented Germany at the opening of a German-funded rail line that connected the city to the capital Caracas.

Stein then made a visit to Lerwick from 27 July to 14 August, after which she joined the rest of the fleet for the annual maneuvers in the North and Baltic Seas.

Stosch and Gneisenau joined her, and the three ships stopped in Havana, Cuba, where unrest against the Spanish colonial government threatened Germans in the city.

In late January 1896, the ships could leave the area, and early the next month Stein went to Caracas to support the German ambassador who was negotiating with the Venezuelan government over payment for the railway opened in December 1893, a classic example of gunboat diplomacy.

After stopping in several harbors in the Levant, Stein stayed in Alexandria, Egypt with Moltke and Gneisenau, finally returning to Kiel on 25 March 1897.

The ships did go to the West Indies this year, and in early December, Stein and Charlotte were sent to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, where Haitians had attacked German nationals.

She returned to Kiel on 1 April and, over the course of 30 May to 1 August, she took part in training exercises, made a visit to Riga to participate in celebrations marking the 700th anniversary of the city's founding, and toured ports in the North Sea.

Stein reached Port of Spain on 18 October and joined the East American Cruiser Division, though she returned to Germany on 6 January 1902.

She moved to Kiel on 17 March to begin preparing for the year's training routine, which began in mid-May with exercises in the Baltic and North Seas.