The castle is first mentioned in documents in 1056. In 1353 she fell to the house Wettin. Due to its strategic importance, it was expanded in the following 150 years to one of the largest castles in Germany. After the transfer of the court to the city in the 16th century, the Veste served only as a national fortress.
A famous guest in 1530 was the reformer Luther, who worked on his Bible translation during the Augsburg Reichstag. Major construction activities began again with Duke Ernst I (1806-1844). In the 19th century Karl Alexander von Heideloff renewed the architecture in the sense of a jewel-rich Neugotik. From 1906, the castle historian and architect Bodo Ebhardt redesigned the facility.
Today, the castle is home to the art collections of Veste Coburg. They are among the most important collections of art and cultural history in Germany and are largely based on the art of the Coburg dukes. The museum includes a copper engraving cabinet, a collection of hunting weapons and glasses, as well as a carriage and sledge collection. Among the artworks, paintings by Lucas Cranach and Old German painting (Dürer, Grünewald, Holbein) and sculptures by Tilman Riemenschneider are particularly noteworthy.