The Hofburg Imperial Palace is the largest palace in the city of Vienna. It was the residence of most of the Austrian royalty, especially the Habsburg dynasty (for more than 600 years), and the emperors of Austria and Austria-Hungary. Today it is the residence of the President of the Austrian Republic.

The Hofburg is known as a winter residence, as the favourite summer residence of the imperial family was Schönbrunn Palace.

It houses the Sissi Museum and the imperial salons and has 2,600 rooms in 18 wings.

Most of the rulers who have occupied this palace, the seat of power for six centuries, have wanted to leave their mark. From Gothic to historicism, in vogue in the 19th century, all styles are represented in the dozen or so buildings that make up the palace. These buildings include the former imperial salons, museums, two chapels (St. Joseph's Chapel in the Leopoldine wing and the Gothic St. Michael's Chapel), the Austrian National Library, the Spanish Riding School, the Vienna Museum of Ethnology and the offices of the President of the Republic.

Numerous architects worked on the Hofburg as it expanded, notably the Italian architect-engineer Filiberto Luchese, Lodovico Burnacini, Carlo Martino Carlone, Domenico Carlone, Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach and his son Joseph Emanuel Fischer von Erlach, and the architects of the Neue Burg built between 1881 and 1913.

From the Kaiserappartements, twenty rooms are now open to the public in the Reichkanzleitrakt (1728-1730) and Amalienburg (1575): these are the rooms where Franz Joseph I lived from 1857 to 1916, and the same rooms where Empress Elisabeth (Sissi) lived from 1854 to 1898, and where Tsar Alexander I lived during the Congress of Vienna. These areas are managed by the state-owned Schloß Schönbrunn Kultur- und Betriebsgesellschaft.

In addition to the Sisi Museum, the palace houses the Old Silver Chamber and Court Table, which presents valuable Habsburg porcelain, glass and silver services, and the Treasure Chamber, which is the name given to 21 rooms occupied by treasures, both sacred and secular, amassed by the Habsburgs over the centuries. These treasures include the crown jewels, the Ecclesiastical Treasury and the insignia of the Holy Roman Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Order of the Golden Fleece, the Burgundian Heritage, the Treasury of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, the painting of Emperor Maximilian I by Bernhard Strigel and the treasures acquired when he married Mary of Burgundy in 1477.

Other museums within the palace include the Papyrus Museum in Vienna and the Ephesus Museum. Other museums include the Spanish Riding School.

The halls of the Hofburg provide the setting for the classical concerts organised by the Wiener Hofburg Orchestra from May to December.

The programme consists of the most famous melodies from operettas and waltzes by Johann Strauss, Franz Lehár and operatic arias by Wolfgang A. Mozart.

The orchestra consists of 36 musicians and 6 international solo singers from Vienna's most important orchestras under the baton of conductor Gert Hofbauer.

As a curiosity, it should be noted that it also hosted the Eurovision Song Contest in 1967.