Naval warfare of World War I

Naval warfare of World War I
Part of World War I

Clockwise from top left: the Cornwallis fires in Suvla Bay, Dardanelles 1915; U-boats moored in Kiel, around 1914; a lifeboat departs from an Allied ship hit by a German torpedo, around 1917; two Italian MAS in practice in the final stages of the war; manoeuvres of the Austro-Hungarian fleet with the Tegetthoff in the foreground
DateJuly 28, 1914 – November 11, 1918
Location
Result Allied victory
Belligerents
Central Powers: Allied Powers:
 United Kingdom
 France
 Italy (1915–18)
 United States (1917–18)
 Russia (1914–17)
 Japan
 Australia
 Greece (1917–18)
Commanders and leaders
German Empire Hugo von Pohl
German Empire Gustav Bachmann
German Empire Von Holtzendorff
German Empire Reinhard Scheer
German Empire Maximilian von Spee 
Austria-Hungary Anton Haus
Austria-Hungary Maximilian Njegovan
Austria-Hungary Miklós Horthy
Ottoman Empire Wilhelm Souchon
Ottoman Empire Hubert von Rebeur
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland John Fisher
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Henry Jackson
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland John Jellicoe
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Rosslyn Wemyss
French Third Republic Louis Pivet
French Third Republic Charles Aubert
French Third Republic Marie de Jonquieres
French Third Republic Ferdinand De Bon
Kingdom of Italy Luigi of Savoy-Aosta
United States Navy William S. Benson
Russian Empire Nikolai Essen
Russian Empire Vasily Kanin
Russian Empire Adrian Nepenin
Russian Empire Andrei Eberhardt
Russian Empire Alexander Kolchak
Empire of Japan Ijuin Gorō
Australia George Edwin Patey
Australia William Pakenham
Australia Arthur Leveson
Australia Lionel Halsey
Kingdom of Greece Pavlos Kountouriotis

Naval warfare in World War I was mainly characterised by blockade. The Allied Powers, with their larger fleets and surrounding position, largely succeeded in their blockade of Germany and the other Central Powers, whilst the efforts of the Central Powers to break that blockade, or to establish an effective counter blockade with submarines and commerce raiders, were eventually unsuccessful. Major fleet actions were extremely rare and proved less decisive.