Clube Desportivo Santa Clara was founded in 1921 in Ponta Delgada on the island of São Miguel, making it the leading club of the Azores archipelago. Home matches are played at the Estádio de São Miguel, which holds about 12,500 and requires visiting teams to make a flight of well over a thousand kilometres from mainland Portugal.

The club won the second division in 2000-01 and again in 2023-24, and took the third-tier title in 1997-98. Santa Clara first reached the Primeira Liga in 1999-2000 but went straight back down, then spent around fifteen years in the second tier before returning in 2018. Its finest campaign came in 2020-21 with a sixth-place finish and qualification for the inaugural UEFA Europa Conference League, a feat matched by a fifth-place finish and club-record points total in 2024-25.