Overview
British purpose-designed aircraft carrier laid down during World War I and completed in 1924.
Developed for Royal Navy, HMS Hermes (1924) belongs to the Aircraft carriers and naval aviation ships family and is associated with World War I, Interwar period, and World War II. Its documented designations include Aircraft carrier, while its intended roles include Aircraft carrier and Purpose built carrier.
Development and construction
The design incorporated purpose-built carrier features, including an island superstructure, during a prolonged postwar construction period.
The documented program for HMS Hermes (1924) lists 1 planned, 1 ordered, 1 laid down, 1 completed, and 0 cancelled, with design work beginning in 1917, construction beginning in 1918, and construction ending in 1924. These figures define the scale and chronology currently supported by the class sources.
Design characteristics and intended role
The surviving classification data associates HMS Hermes (1924) with Island superstructure and Full length flight deck. Read together with the recorded roles of Aircraft carrier and Purpose built carrier, these attributes show the operational problem the design was intended to address without implying specifications that the sources do not establish.
The class record identifies Royal Navy as the principal design or service authority. Where individual ships changed navy, name, or pennant, those later identities are retained on the ship pages rather than treated as separate vessels.
Service history and class roster
Hermes served through the interwar period and into World War II.
The class roster currently links 1 ship. Named members include HMS Hermes. The linked ships are associated with Royal Navy.
Historical significance
Represents the transition from experimental conversions to purpose-designed carrier layouts.
HMS Hermes (1924) is most useful when read as both a design and a group of individual careers. The class page establishes the shared technical and operational context; the linked ship pages preserve differences in construction, service identity, deployment, transfer, preservation, and fate where those details are documented.
Ships in this class
Showing 1 recorded class members.
Sources and further reading
- Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1922–1946Conway Maritime Press
- Treaty Between the United States of America, the British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan, Limiting Naval Armament ↗U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian · accessed 2026-09-18
- HERMES aircraft carrier (1924) ↗Navypedia · accessed 2026-09-18