Winona State University is a public university in Winona, Minnesota, United States. It was founded as First State Normal School of Minnesota in 1858 and is the oldest member of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities System. It was the first normal school west of the Mississippi River.

The university offers more than 80 programs on its main campus as well as collegiate programs on satellite campuses at Winona State University-Rochester. Its average annual enrollment is approximately 6,000 undergraduate and graduate students. Its sports teams compete as the Winona State Warriors in the NCAA Division II athletics in 14 sports, primarily in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference.

Winona State University was founded as the First State Normal School, an institution specifically for educating and producing new elementary school teachers. In the 1850s, Minnesota was on the American frontier and lacked trained teachers. Winona settler John Ford lobbied the Minnesota Legislature to establish normal schools and rallied more than $5,000 in local donations to establish the state's first such institution. It was also the first tax-funded school west of the Mississippi River.

Classes at Winona Normal School began in September 1860, but the next year most of the male students as well as the principal and other staff left to serve in the American Civil War. The school closed in March 1862 due to the war, then for another two years due to the Sioux War of 1862. Its first class graduated in 1866. The program soon added a laboratory school in which local children received education from faculty while students observed or, occasionally, led lessons themselves. The normal school quickly outgrew its original four-room building, but state funding and local donations of money and land led to the construction of a proper facility in 1869.

The campus expanded with two new wings on "Old Main" in 1894, a library/gymnasium/kindergarten building—Ogden Hall—in 1909, and a women's dormitory—Morey Hall—in 1910. In 1915 a new building was constructed to house the laboratory school, and a second women's dormitory—Shepard Hall—appeared in 1920.

Winona State Normal School became Winona Teachers College in 1921 and was authorized to grant a four-year Bachelor of Education degree. In December 1922 a fire broke out in Old Main and completely destroyed it. No one was harmed, as it was during a term break. Local public buildings and churches offered space for classes and administrative business until a new main building, College Hall, was constructed in 1924.

The 1915 Model School Building, now Phelps Hall, and the 1924 College Hall, now Somsen Hall, were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2013 for having local significance in education. They were nominated as examples of the normal school movement, which helped shape public education in Minnesota. Winona Normal School was Minnesota's first teacher training school and first laboratory school, and operated from 1860 to 1971.

The student newspaper has been called The Winonan since 1922.