Austin is a city in Mower County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 24,718 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Mower County. The town was originally settled along the Cedar River and it has two artificial lakes called East Side Lake and Mill Pond. The town was named for Austin R. Nichols, the first settler in the area.

Hormel Foods Corporation is the largest employer in Austin, and the town is sometimes called "SPAM Town USA". Austin is home to Hormel's corporate headquarters, a factory that makes most of North America's SPAM tinned meat, and the Spam Museum. Austin is also home to the Hormel Institute, a leading cancer research institution operated by the University of Minnesota with significant support from the Mayo Clinic.

Austin has been named one of the "Top 10 Affordable Small Towns Where You'd Actually Want to Live," as well as one of the "Best Small Cities in America" for 2015.

Fertile land, trapping, and ease of access brought first trappers and then the early pioneers to this region. The rich gameland attracted a trapper named Austin Nichols, who built the first log cabin in 1853. At that time there were "about twenty families in the area." More settlers began to arrive by wagon train in 1855, and by 1856, enough people were present to organize Mower County. It was in 1856 that the settlement adopted the name Austin, in honor of its first settler. That year the first hotel opened to travelers and the first physician moved to town, Dr. Ormanzo Allen. The first newspaper, the Mower County Mirror, was started in 1858.

Mills, powered by the Cedar River, were the first industries in Austin. They provided much-needed flour and lumber for the growing village. Growth was slow during the first two decades, but the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul railroad arrived in the late 1860s, hastening economic development. The town's first schoolhouse was constructed in 1865 and the first bank opened its doors the following year.

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