The station building is a simple wooden structure of modern design which is colocated with a post-office.

[2][3] The private Daito Railway (大湯鉄道) had opened a track between Ōita and Onoya in 1915.

The Daito Railway was nationalized on 1 December 1922, after which Japanese Government Railways (JGR) undertook the next phase of expansion of what it designated as the Daito Line, extending the track and opening Yunohira as the new western terminus on 29 September 1923.

Yunohira became a through-station on 29 July 1925 when the track was further extended to Kita-Yufuin (today Yufuin.

With the privatization of Japanese National Railways (JNR), the successor of JGR, on 1 April 1987, the station came under the control of JR Kyushu.