The newspaper started publishing as the weekly Abilene Reporter, helmed by Charles Edwin Gilbert, on June 17, 1881, just three months after Abilene was founded.

[2] In 1937, the company merged its morning paper, The Morning News, with the afternoon Daily Reporter to form the Abilene Reporter-News.

The newspaper published morning and evening editions into the 1950s.

[3] The E. W. Scripps Company bought the newspaper, along with other Texas-based Harte-Hanks papers, in 1997.

[4] The company spun off its newspaper assets into Journal Media Group in April 2015,[5] which was sold to Gannett in 2016.