Engels is the second-largest city of Saratov Oblast, with a population of 226,000 in 2018.
Engels was the capital of the Volga German Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic from 1918 to 1941. Following the German invasion of the Soviet Union, its German inhabitants suffered persecution as Soviet authorities feared they could be spies for Nazi Germany. All Germans were expelled from Engels, with most being sent far away to Siberia and the Kazakh SSR. In 2011, a monument in honor of the Russian-German victims of repression within the Soviet Union was unveiled in the city.
It was known as Pokrovskaya sloboda until 1914, and as Pokrovsk until 1931.
Primary administrative division