The reigning world champions suffered a 2-0 defeat to Chile at the Maracana, ensuring they will miss out on a spot in the round of 16, after the Netherlands had earlier prevailed 3-2 over Australia in Group B.
Wednesday's results saw the Netherlands and Chile move to six points each, while Australia and Spain sit third and fourth respectively on zero and Del Bosque's men await a brutal reception when they head home, judging by the headlines in their local media.
Spain's most popular newspaper - El Pais - declared 'Espana fue el Titanic' (Spain was the Titanic), while their main rival El Mundo labelled the team's elimination as 'Fracaso Mundial' (Global Failure).
El Correo - the most popular newspaper in the Basque country - led with 'El campeon pierde su estrella' (The champion loses its star), while Spain's two leading sports newspapers were no less damning.
Marca declared 'the party's over' on their English website, while the opening line of AS' main report bemoaned a 'horrible' ending to Spain's era of dominance.
"As endings go, this was a particularly horrible one," Juanma Trueba wrote for AS.
"But we knew that it had to come some day. Nevertheless, we could never have imagined it would be so pitiful and the Spain side so unrecognisable and ordinary-looking."
The loss to Chile ensured Spain joined the likes of Italy in 2010 and France in 2002 as World Cup title-holders that have been eliminated four years after lifting the trophy.
But with Spain having also won two straight European Championships around their inaugural World Cup triumph in South Africa, it seemed unlikely that Del Bosque's team would collapse so abruptly.
Trueba connected Spain's decline with that of Barcelona, who completed a trophyless season for the first time in six years in 2013-14, while Marca took aim at Diego Costa - 'the experiment that failed'.
Costa was pinched from under Brazil's noses earlier this year and the Atletico Madrid striker, who scored 36 goals in all competitions for his club last season, had been expected to add an element of directness up front Spain had been accused of lacking.
Instead, having started the tournament still struggling with a hamstring injury, Costa has played two games for no goals, while Spain are set to leave Brazil after their final Group B encounter against Australia on Monday.
