Charles Albert (Italian: Carlo Alberto I; 2 October 1798 – 28 July 1849), also called "The Hesitant" for his variable political lines, was the King of Sardinia from 1831 to 1849. His name is bound up with the first Italian constitution, the Albertine Statute, and the First Italian War of Independence (1848–1849). He abdicated after his forces were defeated by the Imperial Austrian army at the Battle of Novara (1849), and died in exile soon thereafter.

An American historian says he was a:

He was born in Turin in October 1798, to Charles Emmanuel, Prince of Carignano and Maria Cristina of Saxony. His father was the great-great-great-grandson of Thomas Francis, Prince of Carignano, youngest legitimate son of Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, and founder of the Carignano line of the House of Savoy. He was the third cousin once removed of Victor Amadeus III, and the next male-line heir after the three sons of Victor Amadeus. When Charles Albert was born in 1798, none of his cousins had a son, making him the likely eventual successor on the throne of Sardinia.

He was educated in the intellectually liberal atmosphere of Geneva, then in Paris during the First French Empire of Napoleon Bonaparte. Napoleon named him a lieutenant of dragoons in 1814. After the final fall of Napoleon the following year, Charles Albert returned to Turin. Two mentors were entrusted with countering the dangerous ideas about "national liberation" ("liberté, égalité, fraternité/liberty, equality, fraternity") Charles had learned in France. However, he continued to display some sympathies with the liberals.

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