Cool Cymru (Welsh: Cŵl Cymru) was a Welsh cultural movement in the 1990s and 2000s. The movement saw a rise in the popularity of Welsh music, with bands such as Catatonia, Manic Street Preachers, Stereophonics and Super Furry Animals but also saw developments in Welsh politics, sport, visual art and TV and film.

Cool Cymru is often seen as more of a wide-ranging movement than its British equivalent, lasting well into the twenty-first century. Some commentators have linked the movement to a new cultural confidence in the nation and a more positive view of Wales outside the country while others have criticised it as homogenous and jingoistic.

The term Cool Cymru (Cymru is the Welsh name for Wales) derives as a Welsh alternative to Cool Britannia (itself a pun on the British patriotic song "Rule, Britannia!"). Cool Britannia described the revival of British art and culture in the mid-1990s which was centred on London, emphasised British culture and used British symbols such as The Union Jack.

The term Cool Cymru gained popularity for the cultural figures and phenomena which were specifically Welsh or Welsh in origin, and continued to be used by Welsh and British commentators long after the term Cool Britannia has fallen out of favour. By 1998 many Welsh cultural figures were gaining prominence across the UK, at a time when the use of Cool Britannia was being maligned by some cultural commentators as a ubiquitous term for any part of British culture.

Commentators have alluded to both Cool Britannia and Cool Cymru as by-products of social and economic issues that dominated the UK in the 1970s and 1980s. In Wales, this era saw the rejection of a devolved Welsh government in a 1979 referendum and the shift in economic policy during the Premiership of Margaret Thatcher; which led to the 1984 Miners' Strike) and the eventual closure of collieries throughout the UK. This resulted in an era of unprecedented turmoil in the south Wales Valleys, with unemployment rates ranking amongst the highest in the whole United Kingdom well into the twenty-first century.

1997 United Kingdom general election in Wales saw the rise of New Labour and a landslide victory for Welsh Labour, winning 34 of 40 Welsh constituencies, a result which also saw the Welsh Conservatives lose all of their MPs, leaving them without Welsh representation for the first time since the 1906 general election. The new Labour government had promised another vote on devolution for Wales in its manifesto, with a referendum being held shortly after the UK election on 18 September 1997. The new referendum saw a reversal of the 1979 result, with a narrow win in favour of establishing a new Government of Wales.

Five months after referendum, the band Catatonia released their album, International Velvet, and would perform the album's title track at the opening ceremonies of both the new government and the 1999 Rugby World Cup. The contemporary anthem would also be used by the BBC for sports trailers and was used to illustrate a post-referendum national confidence by academics and commentators both inside and outside of Wales as an example of Cool Cymru.

The economic decline of Wales in the 1980s was mirrored in the era's music. While artists such as Shakin' Stevens achieved great success and became the UK's top selling artist of the decade, his Rockabilly persona and musicality were a deliberate attempt to evoke nostalgia in an older generation, familiar with American culture and music of the 1950s.