General-Admiral was the lead ship of her class of armored cruisers built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the early 1870s. She is generally considered the first true armored cruiser.
Originally classified as an armored corvette, General-Admiral was redesignated as a semi-armored frigate on 24 March 1875. She was laid out as a central battery ironclad with the armament concentrated amidships. The iron-hulled ship was not fitted with a ram and her crew numbered approximately 482 officers and men.
General-Admiral was long overall. She had a beam of and a draft of . The ship was designed to displace , but displaced as built, an increase of over .
The ship had a vertical compound steam engine driving a single two-bladed propeller. Steam was provided by five cylindrical boilers at a pressure of . The engine produced during sea trials which gave the ship a maximum speed around . General-Admiral carried a maximum of of coal which gave her an economical range of at a speed of . She was ship-rigged with three masts. To reduce drag while under sail her funnel was retractable and her propeller could be hoisted into the hull.