She commenced service on the Australia Station in September 1878.[1] She escorted Sir Hercules Robinson, the Governor of New Zealand from Sydney to Auckland in May 1879. Emerald was sent on a punitive mission in the Solomon Islands in 1879 after the captain and three crew of HMS Sandfly were killed by natives.
Emerald, under Captain William Maxwell, visited the Ellice Islands in 1881.[2][3][4] She left the Australia Station in October 1881 and returned to England.
Emerald was refitted and rearmed in 1882 in England and placed into reserve. She commissioned for the North America and West Indies Station in 1886, before returning to England in 1892 and again being placed into reserve.[1] She was converted into a powder hulk in 1895 at Portsmouth.[1]