Eastern Maori was one of New Zealand's four original parliamentary Māori electorates established in 1868, along with Northern Maori, Western Maori and Southern Maori. In 1996, with the introduction of MMP, the Maori electorates were updated, and Eastern Maori was replaced with the Te Tai Rawhiti and Te Puku O Te Whenua electorates.

The electorate included the population centres of Kawerau, , Rotorua and Whakatane.

The electorate included the tribal areas of Ngāti Awa, Te Arawa, Ngāi Tai, Te Whakatōhea and Ngāti Porou.

Eastern Maori included Rotorua and the Bay of Plenty, and the Poverty Bay area down to Gisborne. Originally the electorate extended down the East Coast and included the Wairarapa, but in 1954 the boundaries of the Southern Maori electorate were extended to include much of the East Coast of the North Island up to Napier and Wairoa in Hawke's Bay.

The first Member of Parliament for Eastern Maori was Tāreha Te Moananui, elected in 1868; he was the first Māori MP to speak in Parliament, and he retired in 1870.

James Carroll represented the electorate from 1887 to 1893, but in 1893 he changed to the Waiapu electorate and was replaced by Wi Pere who Carroll had defeated in 1887.

In the 1949 election, the incumbent, Tiaki Ōmana of the Labour Party, was unsuccessfully challenged by National's Turi Carroll.

In the 1963 election, Puti Tīpene Wātene was elected. He was a Mormon and was the first non-Rātana to win a Māori seat since 1938.