Atalanta Bergamasca Calcio (), commonly referred to as Atalanta, is an Italian professional football club based in Bergamo, Lombardy, Italy, who compete in Serie A, the top tier of the Italian league system. Founded in 1907, Atalanta holds the record for having played the most Serie A seasons (64)<!--AS OF 2024-25--> without being based in a regional capital and without having won the league title. Furthermore, the club holds the record for most promotions to the Serie A, and also that for the joint-most Serie B titles, alongside Genoa.
Atalanta won the Coppa Italia in 1963 and the UEFA Europa League in 2024. The club qualified for the UEFA Champions League five times, reaching the quarter-finals in 2020, and participated in six seasons of the UEFA Europa League (previously known as the UEFA Cup). Atalanta also reached the semi-finals of the Cup Winners' Cup in 1988, when it was competing in Serie B. This is still the joint-best performance ever by a non-first division club in a major UEFA competition.
The club plays its home games at the New Balance Arena and its main kit colors are black and blue. Atalanta had a long-standing rivalry with nearby club Brescia Calcio until that team's dissolution in 2025; the rivalry continues with Brescia's phoenix club, Union Brescia.
History
Founding and establishment in Serie A (1907–1959)
thumb|right|upright=2|alt=Line graph depicting Atalanta's performances in the Italian league since 1930|Performances of Atalanta in the [[Italian football league system|Italian league since the first season of a unified Serie A]]
Atalanta was founded on 17 October 1907 by students of the Liceo Classico Paolo Sarpi and was named after the female athlete of the same name from Greek mythology. Though it immediately established a football sector, it was not the first football association based in Bergamo: Football Club Bergamo was founded by Swiss emigrants in 1904 and was absorbed into another club, Bergamasca, in 1911. The Italian Football Federation did not recognize Atalanta until 1914, and in 1919 announced that it would only allow one club from Bergamo to compete in the highest national league (then called the Prima Categoria<!--not the same as the modern Prima Categoria, level 7-->).
Atalanta competed in the Seconda Divisione, the second tier, during the early 1920s. In the 1927–28 season, the club won its group and subsequently defeated Pistoiese in the playoffs to win promotion and its first second division league triumph. The club inaugurated its current home stadium in the Borgo Santa Caterina neighborhood in 1928, and was admitted to Serie B, the second tier of the restructured Italian league, in 1929. Atalanta achieved a fifth-place finish in the 1947–48 Serie A under coach Ivo Fiorentini, its highest league finish until 2017. The club earned a reputation as the provinciale terribile (terrible provincial team) during this time as a result of its successes against well-known metropolitan teams such as the Grande Torino, who won Serie A five times during the 1940s.
Coppa Italia victory, decline, and reemergence in Europe (1959–1994)
thumb|left|upright=0.6|alt=Atalanta players lifting the 1962–63 Coppa Italia|Atalanta players Angelo Domenghini and [[Piero Gardoni hoisting the 1962–63 Coppa Italia]]
Atalanta won the Coppa Italia in 1963, defeating Torino 3–1 in the final thanks to a hat-trick by striker Angelo Domenghini. This was the senior team's first major trophy. During the early 1960s, the club made its debut in European competitions, among them the 1961–62 Mitropa Cup, the Coppa dell'Amicizia, and the Coppa delle Alpi. As domestic cup winners, the club qualified for the 1963–64 European Cup Winners' Cup, its first major UEFA competition, though was eliminated by Portuguese club Sporting CP in the first round. Despite playing in Serie B at the time, the club developed several young players who moved on to historically bigger clubs and won the 1982 FIFA World Cup with Italy. Several difficult seasons then saw Atalanta fall into Serie B in 1980 and Serie C1 in 1981, when for the first time in its history, the club would play outside the top two tiers. This was a blow that revitalized the club, from which many changes in management followed.
Under new management, Atalanta comfortably won Group A of Serie C1 in 1982, As Napoli also won Serie A that season and therefore qualified for the European Cup, Atalanta qualified for its second European Cup Winners' Cup. This was a turning point for the club; Emiliano Mondonico was appointed as coach and the club would achieve promotion after only one season in Serie B. In the Cup Winners' Cup, Atalanta lost its first match against Welsh club Merthyr Tydfil, but won the return fixture and went on to reach the semi-finals, where it would be eliminated 4–2 on aggregate by Belgian club K.V. Mechelen, who would eventually win the tournament. In doing so, Atalanta achieved the best finish in a UEFA competition of a club playing outside its country's top flight league. With a sixth-place finish in the 1988–89 Serie A, Atalanta qualified for its first UEFA Cup, though was eliminated by Russian club Spartak Moscow in the first round.
Fluctuating performances (1994–2016)
After several upper mid-table finishes and a narrowly missed UEFA cup qualification in 1993, though would return to Serie A in 1995.