TSG 1899 Hoffenheim trace their roots to 1 July 1899, when a gymnastics club was founded in the small village of Hoffenheim, now a district of Sinsheim in the Baden-Württemberg region of south-west Germany. A football section was added after a merger with local side FV Hoffenheim in 1945, though for most of the twentieth century the club remained an unremarkable amateur outfit drifting between the seventh and ninth tiers of German football.
The club's transformation began around 2000, when Dietmar Hopp — a Hoffenheim alumnus and co-founder of software giant SAP — became the club's financial backer. His investment fuelled a remarkable ascent through the German football pyramid: from the eighth division in the early 1990s to the Bundesliga in just over a decade. Hoffenheim were promoted to the top flight in 2008, having spent only a single season in the 2. Bundesliga. In their debut Bundesliga campaign they finished seventh, with Vedad Ibišević and Demba Ba leading the attack.
The club's defining era came under coach Julian Nagelsmann, appointed in 2016 at just 28 years old. He led Hoffenheim to a fourth-place finish in 2016–17 — qualifying for European competition — and a third-place finish in 2017–18, the club's best ever Bundesliga result and a ticket to the UEFA Champions League group stage for the first time. The club has yet to win a major domestic or continental trophy.
Hoffenheim's identity is inseparable from the debate their rise provoked: critics questioned whether a village club of just 3,300 inhabitants, built on a single patron's wealth rather than organic tradition, belonged among German football's elite. That tension continues to define how the club is perceived across the Bundesliga.