The company was established in Rijeka on 20 January 1947, building on the tradition of various smaller shipping companies which had operated along the Croatian coast since 1872.
Marking the anniversary in its newsletter, the company recalls its rich history, noting that Jadrolinija cruises to remote destinations had been a real hit, and that the Liburnija and Jadran ferries served as hotels for participants in the Tripoli International Fair in Libya due to lack of hotel accommodation.
Outside the season, the Liburnija ferry transported cars as well as tropical fruits from African and Greek ports to Split and Rijeka.
Many vessels have passed through Jadrolinija's fleet - from wooden boats and steamboats to electric vessels. Some of the boats in the company's fleet had built-in tracks. In its home country, the Ero ferry transported railway wagons, and it sailed in the Adriatic with built-in tracks. It was not the only vessel with tracks - the Vladimir Nazor ferry, built at the Kraljevica shipyard, was commissioned as a vessel for the transport of rail tankers from Bakar to Omišalj but its purpose was eventually changed and Jadrolinija obtained it with built-in tracks.
Notwithstanding numerous storms, an occasional maritime accident and a war - Jadrolinija recorded only one passenger death in its history, that of a person killed during a 1991 Yugoslav People's Army air raid on the port of Prizna.
The company's fleet currently has 55 vessels, of which 10 are fast ferries, four are classic passenger boats and 41 ro-ro passenger ships, of which three travel along international routes. Three large ferries - the Marko Polo, the Dubrovnik and the Zadar - operate international lines to Italy (Ancona and Bari). Jadrolinija's fleet transports more than 12 million passengers and three million vehicles annually, which accounts for 80% of all passengers and vehicles transported by sea in Croatia annually.
During the summer season, Jadrolinija operates more than 600 lines a day, and those with the most passengers are available 24 hours a day.