Royal Hungarian Honvéd in the context of "Imperial-Royal Landwehr"

The Austro-Hungarian Army, also known as the Imperial and Royal Army, was the principal ground force of Austria-Hungary from 1867 to 1918, one of the two branches of the Austro-Hungarian Armed Forces. It consisted of three organisations: the Common Army (German: Gemeinsame Armee, recruited from all parts of Austria-Hungary), the Imperial-Royal Landwehr (recruited from Cisleithania) and the Royal Hungarian Honvéd (recruited from Transleithania).

In the wake of fighting between the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary and the subsequent two decades of uneasy co-existence, Hungarian troops served either in ethnically mixed units or were stationed away from Hungarian regions. With the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, the Austro-Hungarian Army was brought into being. It existed until the disestablishment of Austria-Hungary in 1918 following the end of World War I. Common Army units were generally poorly trained and had very limited access to new equipment, because the governments of the Austrian and Hungarian parts of the empire often preferred to generously fund their own units instead of outfitting all three army branches equally. All Landwehr and Honvéd regiments were composed of three battalions, while Common Army regiments had four.

The Royal Hungarian Army (Hungarian: Magyar Királyi Honvédség, German: Königlich Ungarische Armee) was the name given to the land forces of the Kingdom of Hungary in the period from 1922 to 1945. Its name was inherited from the Royal Hungarian Honvéd which went under the same Hungarian title of Magyar Királyi Honvédség from 1867 to 1918. Initially restricted by the Treaty of Trianon to 35,000 men, the army was steadily upgraded during the 1930s and fought on the side of the Axis powers during World War II.

The Austro-Hungarian Armed Forces (German: Bewaffnete Macht or Wehrmacht; Hungarian: Fegyveres Erő) or Imperial and Royal Armed Forces were the military forces of Austria-Hungary. It comprised two main branches: The Army (Landstreitkräfte) and the Navy (Kriegsmarine). Both of them organised their own aviation branches – the Army's Aviation Troops (K.u.K. Luftfahrtruppen) and the Navy's Naval Aviation (K.u.K. Seefliegerkorps). The Army in turn consisted of its own three branches: The Common Army (Gemeinsame Armee), the Imperial-Royal Landwehr (kaiserlich-königliche Landwehr) and the Royal Hungarian Honvéd (königlich ungarische Landwehr).

Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces was the Emperor-King, the professional leader was the Chief of the General Staff and the head of the joint Ministry for military affairs was the Minister of War.

The Common Army (German: Gemeinsame Armee, Hungarian: Közös Hadsereg), as it was officially designated by the Imperial and Royal Military Administration, was the largest part of the Austro-Hungarian land forces from 1867 to 1914, the other two elements being the Imperial-Royal Landwehr (of Austria) and the Royal Hungarian Honvéd. However, it was simply known as the Army (Heer) by the Emperor and in peacetime laws, and, after 1918, colloquially called the k.u.k. Armee (short for Imperial and Royal Army).

Established on 15 March 1867 and effectively disbanded on 31 October 1918 when its Hungarian troops left, the Common Army formed the main element of the "armed power" (Bewaffneten Macht or Wehrmacht) of the new dual monarchy, to which the Imperial and Royal Navy (k.u.k. Kriegsmarine) also belonged. In the First World War all land and sea forces of the monarchy were subordinated to the Armeeoberkommando set up in 1914.