← 1978 1977 1976 1979 in the Soviet Union → 1980 1981 1982
Decades:	1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s
See also:	History of the Soviet Union List of years in the Soviet Union

The following lists events that happened during 1979 in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

• General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union: Leonid Brezhnev (1964–1982)
• Premier of the Soviet Union: Alexei Kosygin (1964–1980)

• 1979 Soviet economic reform^[1]
• SALT II Treaty
• Soviet–Afghan War

• 19 January – Svetlana Khorkina, Russian artistic gymnast
• 22 January – Olga Dolzhykova, Ukrainian-Norwegian chess player and educator.^[2]
• 26 January - Artem Datsyshyn, Ukrainian ballet dancer (d. 2022)
• 1 February - Mikhail Rudkovskiy, former Russian professional football player
• 10 April - Yelena Podkaminskaya, Russian actress
• 30 July - Denis Churkin, former Russian professional football player

• February 6 — Issa Pliyev, military commander (b. 1903)
• March 19 — Iskhak Razzakov, 4th First Secretary of the Communist Party of Kirghizia (b. 1910)
• April 16 — Anatoly Kharlampiyev, founder of sambo (b. 1906)
• April 19 — Aleksandra Troitskaya, microbiologist-leprologist (b. 1896)
• April 27 — Nikolai Vinogradov, navy officer (b. 1905)
• May 7 — Aleksei Smirnov, actor (b. 1920)
• July 1 — Vsevolod Bobrov, athlete (b. 1922)
• July 2 — Larisa Shepitko, film director and screenwriter (b. 1938)
• August 12 — Joseph Serebriany, painter and stage decorator (b. 1907)
• September 25 — Yury Kovalyov, Soviet footballer (b. 1934)
• December 16 — Vagif Mustafazadeh, jazz pianist and composer (b. 1940)

• 1979 in fine arts of the Soviet Union
• List of Soviet films of 1979