Habsburg Spain is a contemporary historiographical term referred to the Spain of the 16th and 17th centuries (1516–1700) when it was ruled by kings from the House of Habsburg (also associated with its role in the history of Central and Eastern Europe). The Habsburg Hispanic Monarchs (chiefly Charles I and Philip II) reached the zenith of their influence and power ruling the Spanish Empire. They controlled territories over the five continents including the Americas, the East Indies, the Low Countries, Belgium, Luxembourg and territories now in Italy, France and Germany in Europe, the Portuguese Empire from 1580 to 1640, and various other territories such as small enclaves like Ceuta and Oran in North Africa. This period of Spanish history has also been referred to as the "Age of Expansion".

With the Habsburgs, Spain was one of the greatest political and military powers in Europe and the world for much of the 16th and 17th centuries. During the Habsburg's period, Spain ushered in the Spanish Golden Age of arts and literature producing some of the world's most outstanding writers and painters and influential intellectuals, including Teresa of Ávila, Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Miguel de Cervantes, Francisco de Quevedo, Diego Velázquez, El Greco, Domingo de Soto, Francisco Suárez and Francisco de Vitoria.

Spain as a unified state came into being de jure after the Nueva Planta decrees of 1707 that succeeded the multiple crowns of its former realms. Spain as a unified state came into being de jure after the Nueva Planta decrees of 1707 that succeeded the multiple crowns of its former realms. After the death in 1700 of Spain's last Habsburg king Charles II, the resulting War of the Spanish Succession led to the ascension of Philip V of the Bourbon dynasty and began a new centralizing state formation.