Hudson is a city in and the county seat of Columbia County, New York, United States. At the 2020 census, it had a population of 5,894. On the east side of the Hudson River, 120 miles (190 km) from the Atlantic Ocean, it was named after the river's explorer, Henry Hudson.

Often called the "Brooklyn of Upstate New York", Hudson is a tourist destination known for its antique shops and boutiques.

The native Mahican people had occupied this territory for hundreds of years before Dutch colonists began to settle here in the 17th century, calling it "Claverack Landing" (as it was later known in English). In 1662, some of the Dutch bought this area of land from the Mahican. Later it was part of the Town of Claverack established by English colonists.

In 1783, after the American Revolution, the area was settled largely by Quaker whalers and merchants hailing primarily from the New England islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, and Providence, Rhode Island, led by Thomas and Seth Jenkins. They capitalized on Hudson being at the head of navigation on the Hudson River and developed it as a busy port. Hudson was chartered as a city in 1785. The self-described "Proprietors" laid out a city grid. By 1786, the city had several fine wharves, warehouses, a spermaceti-works and fifteen hundred residents.

In 1794 John Alsop, of the New York City shipping and commission agents Alsop & Hicks, relocated to Hudson for a brief time. He continued to maintain a part interest in the New York firm and attracted customers from the Hudson area, including: Thomas Jenkins & Sons, Seth Jenkins, and the Paddock family, among others. After Alsop's death in November 1794, his partner, Isaac Hicks, began to focus more of his efforts toward increasing his sale of whale products-especially oil and spermaceti candles. Hudson grew rapidly as an active port and came within one vote of being named by the state legislature as the capital of New York state. It lost to Albany, an historic center of Dutch and English colonial trade from the 17th century.

Hudson grew rapidly, and by 1790 was the 24th-largest city in the United States, then limited to east of the Allegheny Mountains. In 1820, it had a population of 5,310 and ranked as the fourth-largest city in the state of New York, after New York City, Albany, and Brooklyn.

The renowned case of People v. Croswell began in Hudson when Harry Croswell published on September 9, 1802, an attack on President Thomas Jefferson in the Federalist paper The Wasp. The state's Democratic-Republican attorney General Ambrose Spencer indicted Croswell for seditious libel. The case eventually wound up with Alexander Hamilton defending Crosswell before the New York Supreme court in Albany in 1804. Crosswell lost, apparently due the influence of anti-Federalist Justice Morgan Lewis. However, enough state assemblymen had observed the trial that in 1805 they changed the state law on libel.

Construction of the Erie Canal in 1824 drew development west in the state, stimulating development of cities related to Great Lakes trade, such as Rochester and Buffalo. The Hudson River continued to be important to commerce, as it carried lumber and other products from the Midwest to New York and downriver markets.