Darlington railway station is a principal stop on the East Coast Main Line, serving the town of Darlington in County Durham, England. It is 232 miles 50 chains (232.63 miles; 374.37 kilometres) north of London King's Cross. It is situated between Northallerton to the south and Durham to the north. Its three-letter station code is DAR.

The station is well served, since it is an important stop for main line services, with trains operated by London North Eastern Railway, CrossCountry and TransPennine Express; it is also the interchange for Northern Trains services to Bishop Auckland, Middlesbrough and Saltburn. Darlington is the location of the first commercial steam railway, the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

The station building is a Grade II* listed Victorian structure and winner of the Large Station of the Year award in 2005.

The first railway to pass through the area now occupied by the station was built by the Stockton and Darlington Railway, which opened their mineral branch from Albert Hill Junction on their main line to Croft-on-Tees on 27 October 1829. This branch line was subsequently purchased by the Great North of England Railway a decade later to incorporate into their new main line from York, which reached the town on 30 March 1841.

A separate company, the Newcastle & Darlington Junction Railway continued the new main line northwards towards Ferryhill and Newcastle, opening its route three years later on 19 June 1844. This crossed the S&D at Parkgate Junction by means of a flat crossing which would in future years become something of an operational headache for the North Eastern Railway (NER) and London and North Eastern Railway (LNER).

The original Bank Top station, where the two routes met, was a modest affair; it was rebuilt in 1860 to accommodate the expanding levels of traffic on the main line. By the mid-1880s, even this replacement structure was deemed inadequate and so the NER embarked on a major upgrade to facilities in the area. This included an ornate new station with an impressive three-span overall roof on the Bank Top site, new sidings and goods lines alongside it and a new connecting line from the south end of the station (Polam Junction) to meet the original S&D line towards Middlesbrough at Oak Tree Junction near Dinsdale. These improvements were completed on 1 July 1887, when the old route west of Oak Tree closed to passengers; it remained in use for freight until 1967.

The new station, with its broad island platform, was designed by T. E. Harrison, chief engineer, and William Bell, the architect of the NER. It cost £81,000 (equivalent to £11,380,000 in 2023) to construct. It soon became a busy interchange on the main East Coast route, thanks to its rail links to Richmond (opened in 1846), Barnard Castle and Penrith (1862/5) and the Tees Valley Line.

The lines to Penrith (closed in 1962), Barnard Castle (1964) and Richmond (1969) have now gone, along with the bays at the northern end of the station which are now used for car parking. The main line, which was electrified in 1991, and the Tees Valley route remain busy. It is also still possible to travel to Catterick Garrison and Richmond from here, by means of the Arriva North East-operated X26 and X27 buses, which have through National Rail ticketing arrangements. The same company also operated the Sky Express bus service to Durham Tees Valley Airport from the station, but this was withdrawn in January 2009 due to declining demand.

HS2 trains were originally planned to stop at Darlington as part of the eastern leg, but phase 2b was cancelled as part of the Integrated Rail Plan; the entirety of the second phase of HS2 was cancelled in 2023.

As part of a £140 million investment, the station is being redeveloped to increase the reliability, connectivity, and accessibility of the station; the plan resurrects many features of the abandoned Tees Valley Metro. The project includes the construction of a new concourse, multi-storey car park and two new platforms on the current freight avoiding lines. The Tees Valley Combined Authority contributed £43 million towards the upgrade, with the other £96 million being supplied by Network Rail and the Department for Transport. Other key stakeholders in the project include LNER, who manage the station, and Darlington Borough Council.

The upgrade includes the construction of a new Eastern concourse at the station, two new platforms at the station, and the remodelling of the track layout, and a new bridge over the railway on Smithfield Road. The upgrade also includes work to the overhead line equipment and installation of new points and cabling. The project is scheduled to finish in 2025 as part of the Railway 200 celebrations, which mark the anniversary of the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, which began serving Darlington station in 1825.

The East Coast Main Line was closed over six weekends in early 2025 in order to facilitate this work; as part of the closure, work was also carried out on the track at Chester-Le-Street railway station, the demolition of the Allerdene bridge over the railway near Newcastle, and many other smaller projects that made use of the closure. A 50-tonne footbridge was installed during these closures in February 2025, which will connect the existing building with the two new platforms.