Reute (Swiss Standard German pronunciation: [ˈrɔʏtɛ]) is a municipality in the canton of Appenzell Ausserrhoden in Switzerland.

Reute was created due to the division of Appenzell in the wake of the Reformation.

When the canton of Appenzell was divided in 1597 into a Catholic and a Protestant part of the canton, the Catholic majority of Hirschberg wanted to stay with Innerrhoden, while the Protestant minority wanted to go to Ausserrhoden.

In the division of Appenzell (known as the Landteilungsbrief, literally Land division letter or treaty), the land owned by the Protestants was separated from Hirschberg and given to the Protestant Ausserrhoden, where it became the municipality of Reute.

[6] Most of the population (as of 2000[update]) speaks German (97.3%), with Albanian being second most common (1.0%) and French being third (0.4%).

[6] The historical population is given in the following chart:[12] In the 2015 federal election the most popular party was the FDP with 36.2% of the vote.

In the federal election, a total of 217 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 43.7%.

Of these, a total of 29 people worked in 12 businesses in the primary economic sector.