Major general (Maj Gen) is a "two-star" rank in the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurkha ...

and Royal Marines. The rank was also briefly used by the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) an ...

for a year and a half, from its creation to August 1919. In the British Army, a major general is the customary rank for the appointment of division commander. In the Royal Marines, the rank of major general is held by the Commandant General. A Major General is senior to a

Brigadier Brigadier is a military rank, the seniority of which depends on the country. In some countries, it is a senior rank above colonel, equivalent to a brigadier general or commodore, typically commanding a brigade of several thousand soldiers. ...

but subordinate to

lieutenant general Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on th ...

. The rank is OF-7 on the NATO rank scale, equivalent to a rear admiral in the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against Fr ...

or an air vice-marshal in the

and the air forces of many Commonwealth countries. The rank insignia is the star (or 'pip') of the

Order of the Bath The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved bathing (as a symbol of purification) a ...

, over a crossed sword and baton. In terms of orthography, compound ranks were invariably hyphenated, prior to about 1980. Nowadays the rank is almost equally invariably non-hyphenated. When written as a title, especially before a person's name, both words of the rank are always capitalised, whether using the "traditional" hyphenated style of, say, the two World Wars, or the modern un-hyphenated style. When used as common nouns, they might be written in lower-case: "Major General Montgomery was one of several major generals to be promoted at this time."

British Army usage

In the British Army, a division is commanded by a major general. However, other appointments may also be held by major generals. For example, the Commandant of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst is a major general. Until around the 1980s, the heads of each branch of service, such as the

Royal Armoured Corps The Royal Armoured Corps is the component of the British Army, that together with the Household Cavalry provides its armour capability, with vehicles such as the Challenger 2 Tank and the Scimitar Reconnaissance Vehicle. It includes most of the ...

, the

Royal Artillery The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...

and the Corps of Infantry, were major generals. Other, administrative, commands were also appointments for a major general. In addition, the senior officer of the Royal Army Chaplains' Department, the Chaplain-General, is accorded 'the relative precedence' - that is to say the equivalence rather than the full powers and authority - of the rank of major general.

Royal Marines usage

The Commandant General Royal Marines has held the rank of major general since 1996, when the post was downgraded from lieutenant general. As in the British Army, a Royal Marines major general ranks below lieutenant general and above brigadier.

Royal Air Force usage

From its foundation on 1 April 1918 to 31 July 1919, the

briefly used the rank of major-general. The service was a wartime amalgamation of the Army's Royal Flying Corps and the Navy's Royal Naval Air Service, so the ranks were a compromise between these two traditions. The insignia of the rank was derived from that of a Royal Navy rear-admiral and featured a broad gold stripe on the cuff below one narrow gold stripe. The two stripes were surmounted by an eagle (volant and affronty) under a king's crown. The RAF replaced the rank of major-general with the rank of air vice-marshal on 1 August 1919. Despite the short duration, the significance of the RAF to modern warfare was indicated by the number of senior officers who did hold the rank of major-general in the RAF: *

Edward Ashmore Admiral of the Fleet Sir Edward Beckwith Ashmore, (11 December 1919 – 28 April 2016) was a senior Royal Navy officer. He saw active service in the Second World War and later commanded two frigates before achieving high command in the Navy. ...

* Sefton Brancker * George Cayley * Edward Ellington * Philip Game * The Honorable Sir Frederick Gordon *

Frederick Heath-Caldwell Major-General Frederick Crofton Heath-Caldwell, (''né'' Heath: 21 February 1858 – 18 September 1945) was a senior British Army officer, who also served in the early Royal Air Force (RAF). Joining the Royal Engineers in 1877, he saw active ser ...

* John Higgins * Mark Kerr * Charles Lambe *

Charles Longcroft Air Vice Marshal Sir Charles Alexander Holcombe Longcroft, (13 May 1883 – 20 February 1958) was a pilot and squadron commander in the Royal Flying Corps who went on to become a senior commander in the Royal Air Force. He was the first command ...

* Godfrey Paine *

Geoffrey Salmond Air Chief Marshal Sir William Geoffrey Hanson Salmond, (19 August 1878 – 27 April 1933) was a senior commander in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War. Remaining in the Royal Air Force after the war, he held senior appointments in ...

* John Salmond * Ernest Swinton * Frederick Sykes * Hugh Trenchard

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