The area was originally part of the Pejepscot Purchase, land bought in 1714 by an association of people from Boston and Portsmouth following the Treaty of Portsmouth, which brought peace between the Abenaki Indians and the settlers of present-day Maine.

In 1736, however, the Massachusetts General Court granted a large section of the land to veterans of the 1690 Battle of Quebec.

Conflicting claims led to prolonged litigation; consequently, settlement was delayed until after the French and Indian Wars.

[6] Auburn was first settled in 1786 as part of Bakerstown, renamed Poland when it was incorporated by the Massachusetts General Court in 1795.

By annexing land from towns around it, including part of Poland in 1852, Minot in 1873, and all of Danville (first called Pejepscot) in 1867, Auburn grew geographically into one of Maine's largest municipalities.

[6] Farms supplied grain and produce, but with construction of the bridge across the river to Lewiston in 1823, and especially after arrival of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad from Portland in January 1848, the community developed into a mill town.

Other firms manufactured cotton and woolen textiles, carriages, iron goods, bricks and furniture.

The population in 1860 was only about 4,000 but by 1890 it had tripled to 12,000 as a result of its shoe factories attracting many French Canadian immigrants, many of whom arrived by train from Quebec.

In 1917, one factory in Auburn was producing 75 percent of the world's supply of white canvas shoes; however, after World War II the shoe industry began to decline, and between 1957 and 1961 the largest manufacturers closed their factories.

In 2023, Joe Biden became the first sitting United States president to visit Auburn in 111 years, with the previous being William Howard Taft in 1912.

After workers attempted to march across the Androscoggin River from Lewiston to Auburn, Governor Lewis Barrows sent in the Maine Army National Guard.

Some labor leaders, CIO Secretary Powers Hapgood, were imprisoned for months after a Maine Supreme Judicial Court judge issued an injunction seeking to end the strike.

In addition, there are the following schools in the city: Auburn is the home of the Auburn-Lewiston Municipal Airport, located off Hotel Road.

The St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad's main line from Portland to Montreal also runs through the southwestern section of the city, passing near the Auburn/Lewiston Municipal Airport; at Lewiston Junction, a branch leased from the Lewiston and Auburn Railroad runs northwest through Auburn.