Federal elections were held in Germany on 19 January 1919, although members of the standing army in the east did not vote until 2 February. The elections were the first of the new Weimar Republic, which had been established after World War I and the Revolution of 1918–19, and the first with women's suffrage. The previous constituencies, which heavily overrepresented rural areas, were scrapped, and the elections held using a form of proportional representation. The voting age was also lowered from 25 to 20. Austrian citizens living in Germany were allowed to vote, with German citizens living in Austria being allowed to vote in the February 1919 Constitutional Assembly elections.

The Weimar Republic, officially known as the German Reich, was a historical period of Germany from 9 November 1918 to 23 March 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is also referred to, and unofficially proclaimed itself, as the German Republic. The period's informal name is derived from the city of Weimar, which hosted the constituent assembly that established its government. In English, the republic was usually simply called "Germany", with "Weimar Republic" not commonly used until the 1930s.