Gonzaga University (GU) (/ɡənˈzæɡə/ ghən-ZAG-ə) is a private Jesuit university in Spokane, Washington. It is accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. Founded in 1887 by Joseph Cataldo, an Italian-born priest and Jesuit missionary, the university is named after the young Jesuit saint Aloysius Gonzaga. The campus houses 105 buildings on 152 acres (62 ha) of grassland alongside the Spokane River, in a residential setting a half-mile (800 m) from downtown Spokane.

The university grants bachelor's degrees, master's degrees, and doctoral degrees through its college and six schools: the College of Arts and Sciences, School of Business Administration, School of Education, School of Engineering and Applied Science, School of Law, School of Nursing and Human Physiology, and the School of Leadership Studies.

Gonzaga University was founded in 1887 by Italian-American Joseph Cataldo (1837–1928), who had come in 1865 as a Jesuit missionary to the Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest. In 1880, Cataldo built a schoolhouse about 10 to 12 mi (16 to 19 km) northeast of Spokane on the Peone Prairie, to serve children of the Upper Spokane Indians. Cataldo was concerned about the influence and expansion of Protestant schools on the region's native people, and by 1881 was discussing building a Jesuit college with other Jesuit leaders.

The Jesuits chose a location at Spokane Falls (later Spokane) due to its centrality in the Washington, Idaho and Montana region. The Jesuits purchased 320 acres of prime real estate in the city's central business district north of the Spokane River for $936. The Northern Pacific Railway was holding the land in reserve, but Cataldo was able to convince railroad executive John W. Sprague to allow the sale to build the school.

The City of Spokane offered to help pay to build the new college, on the condition that it be a whites only school, in spite of Cataldo's original purpose to educate the local native population. Cataldo's letters seeking the support of Church leadership in Rome warned that Methodists and other Protestants were building schools and that the city funding could go to them if the school was not built soon enough.

Construction was delayed until 1886, and the school opened in 1887 with Father James Rebmann serving as the first Father Superior and seven boys enrolled. They were taught by 17 faculty, made up of Jesuit priests and Jesuits in training, scholastics. By the end of the year, more students enrolled, and two were expelled, ending the year with a student body of 18 boys, all white. Father Joseph Joset, a Jesuit missionary, attempted to enroll two native American boys but was rebuffed due to the whites-only policy. Father Rebmann told Joset that the school was only open to "Americans", which he did not consider Indians to be. Non-Catholic boys were also rejected, at least in the college's first years.

Expelled students might have run afoul of rules against offenses like theft, disobedience, impurity, or bans on alcohol and tobacco. The boys were supervised always and not allowed off-campus without a chaperone. They woke at 5:30 AM, and worked until lights out at 8:30 PM. Students attended Mass six days a week, twice on Sundays, and faced often daunting advancement exams. The school was divided into a Preparatory section for elementary school-age boys, an Academic section with Third, Second, and First divisions, and an upper-division like a liberal arts college, for Poetry, Rhetoric and Philosophy. In the second year, enrollment began with 35 boys, 27 of whom were still attending at year's end. By 1890, three of the original 17 faculty members remained. The original Father Superior was followed by Father Charles Mackin, who was replaced in 1891 by Father John Baptist Rene. He served until 1893 and was replaced by Father Leopold Van Gorp.

Students were not allowed to advance to higher classes except upon passage of rigorous examinations that were overseen by the Prefect of Studies. Students might become sick from anxiety while preparing and some withdrew rather than face the exams.

Gonzaga conferred its first Bachelor of Arts degrees to two students. A four-story building was planned in 1897, which opened in 1899 as the New Gonzaga. In 1892, with an enrollment of 50 boys, football, called "college-down", was first played at Gonzaga on Thanksgiving Day. The same year, Gonzaga added a new dormitory, and a wood-framed St. Aloysius Church, and the campus got electric power service for the first time.

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In 2018, the Center for Investigative Reporting published evidence that the Cardinal Bea House, owned by the Jesuit order and located next to Gonzaga's campus, was used by the Catholic Church as a retirement home for priests with histories of sexual predation and abuse from across the Pacific Northwest and Alaska, from the 1970s through 2016. Sexually abusive priests were quietly kept there, out of contact with vulnerable populations yet shielded from any liability for the abuse they had committed. The last abusive priest moved out of the Cardinal Bea House in 2016.

The Spokane Spokesman-Review newspaper questioned Gonzaga President Thayne McCulloh's statements that he did not know, before or during his time as president, about the abusive priests kept at the Cardinal Bea House.

• James Rebmann 1886–1890
• Charles Mackin 1890–1891
• John B. Rene 1891–1893
• Leopold Van Gorp 1893–1894
• Lawrence Palladino 1894–1896
• James Rebmann 1896–1899
• George de la Motte 1899–1901
• Joseph Raphael John Crimont 1901–1904
• Francis Dillon 1904–1905
• Herman Goller 1905–1909
• Louis Taelman 1909–1913
• James Brogan 1913–1920
• John McHugh 1920–1921
• Walter Fitzgerald 1921–1927
• Daniel Reidy 1927–1930
• John Keep 1930–1934
• Leo Robinson 1934–1942
• Francis Altman 1942–1945
• Francis Corkery 1945–1957
• Edmund Morton 1957–1961
• John P. Leary 1961–1969
• Richard E. Twohy 1969–1974
• Bernard J. Coughlin 1974–1996
• Edward Glynn 1996–1997
• Robert J. Spitzer 1998–2009
• Thayne McCulloh 2010–present

Gonzaga's main campus has 105 buildings on 152 acres in the Logan Neighborhood. The university has two large libraries. Foley Center Library is Gonzaga's main graduate and undergraduate library, opened in 1992. Chastek Law Library primarily serves the Gonzaga University School of Law, erected in 2000. The Rosauer School of Education building was completed in 1994.

Gonzaga hosts many unique pieces of artwork, largely devoted to historical religious figures and prominent Catholics. Among the most notable are statues of St. Ignatius, St. Joseph, St. Aloysius, and alumnus Bing Crosby by Deborah Copenhaver Fellows. The Jundt Art Center and Museum established in 1995 also has a variety of artwork from differing periods. The spires of St. Aloysius Church are a landmark of the Spokane area.

Due to an expanding student body, Gonzaga completed construction of a $60 million building that serves as the new Circulus Omnium Gonzagaorum (COG) "center of campus," the John J. Hemmingson Center which replaced the former COG that students used for over 60 years. The three-story building with almost 4 acres (1.6 ha; 167,000 sq ft) of floor space has an all-glass exterior. It was completed in time for the Fall 2015 semester. It also earned a Gold LEED certification.

In 2014, the university made plans to build a performing arts center named after benefactor Myrtle Woldson that would have a 750-seat theater. The building opened to the public in 2019 and holds both a theater and recital hall.

In addition to the campus in Spokane, Gonzaga's virtual campus has degree programs.