Crystal Palace Football Club is an English professional football club based in Selhurst, South London, that competes in the Premier League, the highest level of English football. They were founded in 1905 at the famous Crystal Palace Exhibition building and played their home games at the FA Cup Final stadium, which was situated inside the historic Palace grounds. The club were forced to leave the Palace in 1915 due to the outbreak of the First World War, and played at Herne Hill Velodrome and the Nest until 1924, when they moved to their current home at Selhurst Park.
Palace joined the Football League in 1920, and have overall spent the majority of their time competing in the top two tiers of English football. Since 1964, they have only dropped below the second tier once, for three seasons between 1974 and 1977. Palace enjoyed a successful period in the top flight in the late 1980s and early 1990s, during which they achieved their highest ever league finish in 1990–91 of third place in the old First Division, now known as the Premier League. The club were denied a place in Europe at the end of that season because of the partial UEFA ban on English clubs at that time following the Heysel Stadium disaster. Palace became one of the original founding members of the Premier League. It was also during this period that Palace reached the 1990 FA Cup Final finishing runners-up to Manchester United after a replay. Palace set two unwanted Premier League records for relegation, in 1992–93 they were relegated on 49 points, which is still a record number of points for a relegated Premier League club and are also the only club ever to be relegated from the Premier League when finishing fourth from bottom in 1994–95, as it had been decided that the league would be reduced from 22 to 20 clubs for the following season. The club suffered severe financial problems towards the end of the 1990s and into the 2000s and went into administration twice, in 1999 and 2010. Palace recovered and gained promotion back to the Premier League in 2012–13 where they have remained ever since, and reached another FA Cup final in 2016.
The club's traditional kit colours were originally claret and blue, but in 1973 they decided to change to the red and blue vertical stripes now worn today. Palace have a fierce rivalry with Brighton & Hove Albion, with whom they contest the M23 derby and also share rivalries with fellow South London clubs Millwall and Charlton Athletic.