SMS Kaiser was an ironclad of the Kaiserliche Marine launched on 19 March 1874 and commissioned on 13 February 1875.

In the early 1890s, SMS Kaiser was rebuilt as an armored cruiser and in 1895, assigned to the Ostasiatische Squadron.  It was in this assignment that she participated in the initial occupation of Kiautschou in 1897-1898, and the Philippine Crisis of 1898.

In 1899 she returned to Germany, where she was used as a harbor ship beginning in 1904.  She was renamed Uranus on 12 October 1905 before being stricken from the naval register on 21 May 1906.