Foundation The city of
Wolfsburg was established on 1 July 1938 under the name
Stadt des KdF-Wagens bei Fallersleben to accommodate workers for the newly constructed
Volkswagen factory, which was intended to produce the KdF-Wagen—later known as the
Volkswagen Beetle. The adjacent factory and town were part of a broader initiative to create an affordable car for the German populace during the Third Reich. The first football club associated with the Volkswagen plant was
BSG Volkswagenwerk Stadt des KdF-Wagen, a typical
works team of the era. This team competed in the
Gauliga Osthannover, the top division of regional football, during the
1943–44 and
1944–45 seasons. Following the end of World War II, a new club was formed on 12 September 1945, initially named
VSK Wolfsburg. The team adopted green and white as its colors, a tradition that continues to this day. According to club lore, local youth coach Bernd Elberskirch provided ten green jerseys, and white shorts were fashioned from donated bed sheets sewn by local women. On 15 December 1945, the club faced a significant setback when all but one of its players left to join the newly formed
1. FC Wolfsburg. The sole remaining player, Josef Meyer, collaborated with Willi Hilbert to rebuild the team by recruiting new members. The reorganised club adopted the name
VfL Wolfsburg, with VfL standing for Verein für Leibesübungen, which translates to "Club for Physical Exercise." Within a year, VfL Wolfsburg secured the local
Gifhorn championship. In late November 1946, the club played a friendly match against the prominent
Gelsenkirchen team
Schalke 04 at the Volkswagen-owned stadium, marking its emergence as the company's officially supported team.
Postwar play The club made slow but steady progress in the following seasons. They captured a number of amateur level championships, but were unable to advance out of the promotion playoffs until finally breaking through to the top tier Oberliga Nord in 1954 with a 2–1 victory over
Heider SV. Wolfsburg, however, struggled in the top flight, narrowly missing relegation each season until finally being sent down in 1959. When Germany's first professional football league, the
Bundesliga, was formed in 1963, Wolfsburg was playing in the Regionalliga Nord (II), having just moved up from the Verbandsliga Niedersachsen (III), reaching the German Amateur Championship Final that same year (0–1 vs.
VfB Stuttgart Amat.).
Second division and advance to the Bundesliga Wolfsburg remained a second division team over the next dozen years with their best performance being a second-place finish in 1970. That finish earned the club entry to the promotion round playoffs for the Bundesliga, where they performed poorly and were unable to advance. From the mid-1970s through to the early 1990s, Wolfsburg played as a third division side in the Amateur Oberliga Nord. Consecutive first-place finishes in 1991 and 1992, followed by success in the promotion playoffs, saw the club advance to the
2. Bundesliga for the 1992–93 season. Wolfsburg continued to experience some success through the 1990s. The team advanced to the final of the
German Cup in 1995 where they were beaten 0–3 by
Borussia Mönchengladbach, but then went on to the top flight on the strength of a second-place league finish in 1997. Despite their recent promotion, Wolfsburg developed into a mid-table Bundesliga side. In the 1998–99 season, Wolfsburg, under
Wolfgang Wolf, were holding onto the fifth spot in the 33rd round of fixtures, and they had hopes of making fourth place, to gain
UEFA Champions League participation. Losing 6–1 away to
MSV Duisburg in the final fixture, Wolfsburg finished in sixth place with 55 points and qualified for next season's
UEFA Cup. They also qualified for the
Intertoto Cup in 2000, 2001, 2003, 2004 and 2005, enjoying their best run in 2003 after reaching the final in which they lost to Italian side
Perugia. This was followed by a couple of seasons of little success for the club, just narrowly avoiding relegation with two 15th-place finishes in the
2005–06 and
2006–07 seasons.
Bundesliga title and cup success Ahead of the
2007–08 Bundesliga season, Wolfsburg appointed former
Bayern Munich manager
Felix Magath. The club finished fifth, their highest league position at the time, and qualified for the
UEFA Cup for only the second time. Under Magath, Wolfsburg achieved the greatest success in the club's history by winning the
2008–09 Bundesliga, sealing the title with a 5–1 victory over
Werder Bremen on 23 May 2009. The team recorded ten consecutive league wins after the winter break, equalling the Bundesliga record for a single season. Strikers
Grafite and
Edin Džeko each scored more than 20 league goals, while
Zvjezdan Misimović provided 20 assists. The title secured Wolfsburg's first qualification for the
UEFA Champions League. The following season, Wolfsburg dismissed head coach
Armin Veh during the winter break with the club tenth in the league. In the
2009–10 UEFA Champions League, they finished third in their group behind
Manchester United and
CSKA Moscow, entering the
2009–10 UEFA Europa League, where they reached the quarter-finals before being eliminated by
Fulham. Former
England manager
Steve McClaren was appointed head coach in May 2010, becoming the first English manager in Bundesliga history. He was dismissed in February 2011 and replaced by
Pierre Littbarski. Following a run of poor results that left the club in the relegation zone, Wolfsburg reappointed Magath as head coach and sporting director in March 2011. He secured Bundesliga survival but left by mutual consent in October 2012 after a poor start to the season.
Dieter Hecking was appointed head coach in December 2012. Wolfsburg enjoyed renewed success during the
2014–15 season. The club finished runners-up in the
2014–15 Bundesliga and qualified for the
2015–16 UEFA Champions League. On 30 May 2015, Wolfsburg won the
2015 DFB-Pokal final with a 3–1 victory over
Borussia Dortmund, securing the first DFB-Pokal in the club's history. They opened the following season by defeating Bayern Munich on penalties in the
2015 DFL-Supercup. During the 2015 summer transfer window,
Kevin De Bruyne was sold to
Manchester City for a Bundesliga record transfer fee. In the
2015–16 Bundesliga season, Wolfsburg finished eighth. In the Champions League, they reached the quarter-finals for the first time, where they faced
Real Madrid and, despite a two-goal aggregate lead from the first match, were eliminated after losing 3–0 at the
Bernabéu.
Instability and rebuilding Wolfsburg subsequently entered a period of sporting instability marked by relegation battles and frequent managerial changes. On the final matchday of the
2016–17 Bundesliga season, defeat to
Hamburger SV dropped the club from 15th to 16th place. Wolfsburg retained their Bundesliga status by defeating regional rivals
Eintracht Braunschweig 2–0 on aggregate in the relegation play-offs. The following season brought further upheaval. Head coach
Andries Jonker was dismissed in September 2017 and replaced by
Martin Schmidt, who resigned in February 2018.
Bruno Labbadia took charge and guided the club into the relegation play-offs once again, where Wolfsburg defeated
Holstein Kiel 4–1 on aggregate to remain in the Bundesliga. Ahead of the
2018–19 Bundesliga season,
Jörg Schmadtke was appointed managing director for sport, with former Wolfsburg captain
Marcel Schäfer becoming sporting director. Under Labbadia, Wolfsburg finished sixth and qualified for the
2019–20 UEFA Europa League. They were eliminated in the qualifying play-off round by
AEK Athens. Labbadia departed in 2019 and was succeeded by
Oliver Glasner. Wolfsburg finished seventh in 2019–20 and fourth in the
2020–21 Bundesliga, qualifying for the
UEFA Champions League 2021–22. Glasner left the club at the end of the season following disagreements with club management. Under successor
Mark van Bommel, Wolfsburg began the
2021–22 Bundesliga season with four consecutive wins but were eliminated from the
DFB-Pokal after a substitution error and subsequently endured a run of poor results. Van Bommel was dismissed in October 2021 and replaced by
Florian Kohfeldt, who secured Bundesliga survival with a 12th-place finish but left the club at the end of the season. Wolfsburg finished bottom of their Champions League group. On 24 May 2022, Wolfsburg appointed
Niko Kovač as head coach on a three-year contract. His tenure ended in March 2024. He was replaced by
Ralph Hasenhüttl, who led the club to an eleventh-place finish in
2024–25. He was dismissed at the end of the season. Dutch coach
Paul Simonis was appointed in June 2025 but was dismissed after ten league matches, with youth coach
Daniel Bauer initially taking interim charge before being appointed permanent head coach in December 2025. ==Kit manufacturers and shirt sponsors==