"Sperber" meanwhile had been reactivated in December 1902 in response to the Venezuelan crisis of 1902–1903; she was sent there in January 1903, though by the time she arrived the crisis had subsided and she was no longer necessary. She was therefore transferred first to German East Africa, where she remained only briefly before being moved again, this time to the East Asia Squadron. She served in the unit from late 1903 to early 1905, when she was reassigned to German Southwest Africa. She returned to Germany in early 1911 and was decommissioned in July. In October 1911 "Schwalbe" was recommissioned for use as a special purposes ship. Initially, she was to be a survey ship, but the Navy instead decided to use her to replace the old aviso as a training ship. "Sperber" was stricken from the naval register in 1912 and used as a target ship through World War I. "Schwalbe" continued on as a training ship during the war until 1918, when she too was employed as a gunnery training target. Both ships were sold for scrapping in August 1920 and were broken up in 1922 in Hamburg.