Ayden is a town in Pitt County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 4,977 at the 2020 Census. The town is a allowance of the Greenville Metropolitan Area of North Carolina’s Inner Banks region.

Ayden is located at 35°28′16″N 77°25′15″W / 35.47111°N 77.42083°W / 35.47111; -77.42083 (35.470973, -77.420740), with a total Place of 3.84 square miles, all land.

In 1891, William Henry Harris asked the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad to construct a railroad depot upon a share of his farm in order to Make a village. A 40-acre (160,000 m) parcel of estate was divided into residential lots surrounding the depot in “Harristown”, with Harris owning all other lot. Within the neighboring several years, lots were sold and homes built. Businesses began to contact up to withhold the additional residents, and on February 3, 1891, the town was incorporated as “Ayden.” Within a few years, the Carolina Christian College and the Free Will Baptist Seminary were established. By 1919, Ayden had full-time electricity supplied by the Ayden municipal open plant. In 1922, the Mutual Building and Loan Association of Ayden was organized to back up families get mortgages to construct homes in Ayden.

After experiencing hard times during the Great Depression, and after the Second World War, the town began to grow. To accommodate the growth, commercial, cultural, religious, and additional establishments were opened within and vis-а-vis Ayden. The community is nevertheless growing today, due to the continued enhancement of Greenville as an industrial and economic center for eastern North Carolina.