The Constitution of the Kingdom of the Netherlands of 24 August 1815 (Dutch: Grondwet voor het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden van 24 augustus 1815) is one of two fundamental documents governing the Kingdom of the Netherlands as well as the fundamental law of the Netherlands proper (the territory of the Kingdom mainly situated in Europe). The Kingdom of the Netherlands also includes Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten: there is an overarching instrument of the entire kingdom that has constitution characteristics: the Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Sint Maarten is the only country in the Kingdom of the Netherlands that has a constitutional court to govern the Sint Maarten legislature.

The constitution of the Netherlands is only applicable to the Netherlands proper, i.e. the territory in Europe and its public bodies of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba, the latter three since 2010 special municipalities, in the Caribbean, except when the Charter does not cover a certain legal subject. It is generally seen as directly derived from the one issued in 1815, constituting a constitutional monarchy; it is the third oldest constitution still in use worldwide. A revision in 1848 instituted a system of parliamentary democracy. In 1983, the most recent major revision of the Constitution of the Netherlands was undertaken, almost fully rewriting the text and adding new civil rights.

The text is sober, devoid of legal or political doctrine and includes a bill of rights. It prohibits the judiciary from testing laws and treaties against the constitution, as this is considered a prerogative of the legislature. There is no constitutional court in the Netherlands.

The first constitution of the Netherlands as a whole, in the sense of a fundamental law which applied to all its provinces and cities, is the 1579 constitution, which established the confederal Dutch Republic. The constitution was empowered by the Union of Utrecht, thus by treaty. Article XIII of the treaty granted each inhabitant of the Republic freedom of conscience.

After the French invasion of 1795, the Batavian Republic was proclaimed. On 31 January 1795 it issued a bill of rights, the Verklaring van de rechten van de mens en van de burger [nl]. The newly-established National Assembly was tasked with drafting a constitution, the first of the Netherlands in the modern formal sense. Its members disagreed about the extent of suffrage and about whether to organise the republic as a federal or unitary state. A compromised constitution was rejected in a referendum, and a coup d'état was carried out by those favouring a unitary state with a powerful central government, similar to that of the revolutionary French First Republic. The Constitution for the Batavian People was enacted after it received support from an overwhelming majority in another April 1798 referendum. Only those who swore allegiance to the coup were allowed to vote. The constitution outlined the organisation of the national government, and it enshrined equality between citizens and included civil rights such as freedom of speech, assembly, and religion. The Napoleonic Kingdom of Holland, a constitutional monarchy, was established by the Constitutie voor het Koningrijk Holland on 7 August 1806. In 1810 the kingdom was annexed by the French Empire.

After the French troops were driven out by Russian Cossacks, the new Sovereign Principality of the United Netherlands was established by the constitution of 29 March 1814, the Grondwet van den Staat der Verëenigde Nederlanden. William VI of Orange was instated on 2 December 1813 as "Sovereign Prince" by acclamation, but and only accepted "under the safeguard of a free constitution, assuring your freedom against possible future abuses." He first appointed 600 men of good standing as electors (Assembly of Notables) and these approved the constitution, written by a commission headed by Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp. On 24 August 1815 William — since 16 March King William I of the Netherlands — having proclaimed himself King of the larger United Netherlands six days earlier, issued the first version of the current constitution, the Grondwet voor het Koningrijk der Nederlanden or Loi fondamentale du Royaume des Pays-Bas, establishing the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now expanding his realm with the territory of the present state of Belgium, which would again secede from it in 1830. It included a limited unentrenched bill of rights, with freedom of religion, the principle of habeas corpus, the right of petition and freedom of the press as its main points. In the Treaty of London of 1814 the Allies ordered that the original Dutch state would devise a new constitution. It was approved by the new States General (consisting of 55 members) of the Northern Netherlands, but rejected by the majority of appointed electors (796 against 527) of the Southern Netherlands. However, 126 appointed members indicated that they objected to the new constitution because they believed in stronger provisions for freedom of religion. Since freedom of religion was guaranteed under the Treaty of Vienna, their votes and abstaining votes were counted in support of the new constitution instead. This infamous "Hollandic Arithmetic" left William feeling justified in his proclamation of the new kingdom.

Regarding the government's political structure, the 1815 constitution did not diverge much from the situation during the Republic: the 110 members of House of Representatives (lower house) of the States General, the "Second Chamber" as it is still called, were still appointed by the States-Provincial (for three years; each year a third was replaced), who themselves were filled with nobility members or appointed by the city councils, just like under the ancien régime. However, the new constitution provided for some rural delegates, elected through electoral colleges and appointed to all States-Provincial (first only true for Friesland) and the city councils. The electoral colleges, in turn, were elected by a select group of male citizens of good standing and paying a certain amount of taxes. Thus, a modicum of democracy was indirectly introduced into the system. Generally, however, the administration was monarchical: the King had control over appointments to the Senate, also known as the "First Chamber" and mockingly referred to as the Ménagerie du Roi. In 1840, when a new revision was made necessary by the independence of Belgium, a first step to a more parliamentary system was taken by the introduction of penal ministerial responsibility.

The constitution as it was revised on 11 October 1848 is often described as the original of the version still in force today. Under pressure from the Revolutions of 1848 in surrounding countries, King William II accepted the introduction of full ministerial responsibility in the constitution, leading to a system of parliamentary democracy, with the House of Representatives directly elected by the voters within a system of single-winner electoral districts. Parliament was accorded the right to amend government bills and to hold investigative hearings. The States-Provincial, themselves elected by voters, appointed by majorities for each province the members of the Senate from a select group of upper class citizens. A commission chaired by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke was appointed to draft the new proposed constitution, which was finished on 19 June. Suffrage was expanded (though still limited to census suffrage), as was the bill of rights with the freedom of assembly, the privacy of correspondence, freedom of ecclesiastical organisation and the freedom of education.