Laurel is a city in Yellowstone County, Montana, United States. It is the third largest community in the Billings Metropolitan Statistical Area, and is located in the Yellowstone Valley, as an east–west terminal division dwindling of the Burlington-Northern Railroad. The population was 7,222 at the 2020 census.

Laurel is house to a Cenex Harvest States oil refinery and Montana Rail Link’s Laurel Yard, the largest rail yard amid St. Paul, Minnesota and Pasco, Washington.

Before Laurel became a city or a community, people passed through the site during the gold hurry period, when gold was discovered at the Clarks Fork headwaters. They came by team and wagon, and by small steamer vessels occurring the Yellowstone River. The handing out was in the process of planning a railroad to the west coast, and had surveying crews out to map the country upon the most dispatch route. Many of the prospectors that went west in search of gold, felt gold might be found in additional parts of the state, so some returned to the Yellowstone Valley, and others came from the East to decide here. However, this did not accept place until after the Custer Massacre in 1876. It was not until 1877 that the white man felt safe in the Yellowstone Valley, after the aptitude of the Sioux was broken. So it was that even though the memory of the Massacre of General Custer and his Command upon the Little immense Horn River was nevertheless fresh in the minds of settlers of Montana, that a Tiny community was received in the Yellowstone Valley.

The history of Laurel began bearing in mind settlers began making their homes in the vicinity in 1879. There was a section house built that served as a depot and make known office, situated virtually where Hobo Hill is, or close the middle of the gift railroad yards east of Laurel. The railroad pushed closer to Laurel from the east, up the Yellowstone Valley during the summer of 1882. Up to this time, there were very nearly 200 people in the community. With the advent of the railroad, the population grew to 368 in 1900, 806 in 1910, and 2,338 in 1920.