Wells River is a village in the town of Newbury in Orange County, Vermont, United States. The population was 431 at the 2020 census. The village center is located at the junction of U.S. Routes 5 and 302.

The village center (the portion near the confluence of the Wells River and the Connecticut River) was supplementary to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 as Wells River Village Historic District. The district covers 84 contributing properties beyond an area of 390 acres (1.6 km). It includes examples of Classical Revival, Federal, and Late Victorian styles. The architectural feel of the district represents the building traditions of nineteenth-century Vermont, showcasing a broad array of building styles.

The area was first called Governor’s Right because 500 acres (200 ha) were granted to Governor Benning Wentworth of New Hampshire. It was purchased by Er Chamberlin, who built a gristmill upon the Wells River. Located at the head of navigation for the Connecticut River, Wells River developed as a center for trade. Canal boats guided by long poles floated downriver laden with lumber, clapboards and shingles, returning as soon as goods such as iron, salt, rum and molasses. In the 1830s and 1840s, Jacob Kent Jr. was the executive of the Coosuck House, a well-known Wells River hotel.

On November 6, 1848, the Connecticut and Passumpsic Rivers Railroad opened to Wells River, rendering archaic the river’s barge traffic. In 1853–1854, the Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad reached Woodsville, New Hampshire across the Connecticut River. It built estrangement offices and repair facilities, transforming that village into a rich railway town. The parentage replaced the 1805 bridge more than the narrows to Wells River subsequently a two-level wooden span which comprehensive a toll highway deck at the bottom of the truss, with railroad tracks on the roof. In 1903, a steel bridge of thesame configuration replaced it. In 1873, the Montpelier and Wells River Railroad was completed, enhancing the region’s aim as a railroad junction.