The architecture of Atlanta is marked by a confluence of classical, modernist, post-modernist, and contemporary architectural styles. Due to the Battle of Atlanta and the subsequent fire in 1864, the city's architecture retains almost no traces of its Antebellum past. Instead, Atlanta's status as a largely post-modern American city is reflected in its architecture, as the city has often been the earliest, if not the first, to showcase new architectural concepts. However, Atlanta's embrace of modernism has translated into an ambivalence toward architectural preservation, resulting in the destruction of architectural masterpieces, including the Commercial-style Equitable Building (Atlanta's first skyscraper), the Beaux-Arts style Terminal Station, and the Classical Carnegie Library. The city's cultural icon, the Neo-Moorish Fox Theatre, would have met the same fate had it not been for a grassroots effort to save it in the mid-1970s.

Because Atlanta was a settlement that grew from a planned railroad terminus and later a railroad junction, rather than being planned in a grand manner, its antebellum architecture was unremarkable compared to patrician Savannah or other older Southern cities. The town's most important buildings included Edward A. Vincent's Union Station (1853), the Atlanta, Trout House and Washington Hall hotels, and the Atlanta Bank. An 1859 industrial journal noted that:

19 commodious brick stores were erected in 1858…besides a large number of fine residences, mostly of brick. Many of the new improvements are imposing structures, and would not suffer by comparison with the most elegant portions of our modern cities.

Not a single antebellum building from what was the town of Atlanta remains today. Remaining antebellum architecture inside the city limits consists of four houses that were well outside the city limits in the 19th century, as well as the Tullie Smith House which was moved to the Atlanta History Center from a location in North Druid Hills, an adjacent suburb. The oldest building in Downtown Atlanta is the Georgia Railroad Freight Depot (1869).

Most of Atlanta was burned during the Civil War, depleting the city of a large stock of its historic architecture. Yet Atlanta, architecturally, had never been particularly "southern." Because Atlanta originated as a railroad town, rather than a patrician southern seaport like Savannah or Charleston, many of the city's landmarks could have easily been erected in the Northeast or Midwest, and indeed this was one reason why Atlanta referred to itself frequently as "the New York" or "the Chicago of the South."

Throughout the American Renaissance and beyond, Atlantans were amazed at successive waves of ever more impressive hotels, civic and industrial architecture, and office buildings, such as the Equitable Building (8 stories, 1892), Candler Building (17 stories, 1906), and Rhodes-Haverty Building (21 stories, 1929). Among the most notable architects active in Atlanta between the Civil War and World War Two were A. Ten Eyck Brown, Francis Palmer Smith and G. Lloyd Preacher.

During the Cold War era, Atlanta followed global modernist trends, especially with regards to office towers and commercial buildings. Examples of modernist architecture include the Westin Peachtree Plaza (1976), Georgia-Pacific Tower (1982), the State of Georgia Building (1966), and the Atlanta Marriott Marquis (1985).^{[citation needed]}

The era's most notable architect may be Atlanta-native John Portman, whose Hyatt Regency Hotel (1968) made a significant mark on the hospitality sector. A graduate of Georgia Tech's College of Architecture, Portman's work reshaped downtown Atlanta with his designs for the Atlanta Merchandise Mart, Peachtree Center, the Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel, and Truist Plaza.^{[citation needed]}