Bochum II

Runners-up in the Oberliga Westfalen took the side up to the Regionalliga West, the fourth tier, for the 2025–26 season.

Bochum's reserve side was shut down in 2015 and only reactivated for 2024–25.

It plays under the name of a club that dates its own existence to a forced merger: VfL Bochum 1848 was assembled on 14 April 1938 out of TV Bochum 1848, TuS Bochum 08 and SV Germania 06 Bochum, though the parent club counts its history from 1848. The reserve side carries none of that separately — no nickname of its own, just VfL Bochum II or, informally, the Amateure.

Matches there against the reserve sides of Borussia Dortmund and Schalke 04 go by the same label locals give the senior derbies, the kleines Revierderby.

The honours belong to an earlier version of the club. The Oberliga Westfalen title of 1999 was the high point on the fifth tier; titles in the Verbandsliga Westfalen in 1982 and the Landesliga Westfalen in 1975 came from further down still. The reserve side's best run in the DFB-Pokal ended in the second round, in 1984–85.