Walkden is a town within the City of Salford, Greater Manchester, 6 miles (9.7 km) northwest of Salford, and 7 miles (11.3 km) of Manchester.

Historically in the township of Worsley in Lancashire, Walkden was a centre for coal mining and textile manufacture.

In 2014, the electoral wards of Walkden North, Walkden South and Little Hulton had a combined population of 35,616.

The name Walkden or Walkeden derives from the Old English denu, a valley, belonging to a man possibly called Wealca (fuller), an Old English personal name. It has been in existence since at least the 13th century. The name was recorded in documents dating to 1246. In the local dialect and accent, it is pronounced Wogden.

A Roman road crossed the area roughly on the line of the present A6 road through Walkden and Little Hulton. In 1313 in a dispute involving land, a jury decided that Walkden was too small to be considered a hamlet or a town but was "only a place in Farnworth". In the 15th century Walkden appears to have covered a wider area than at present, spreading into Farnworth and Little Hulton. In 1765 "Walkden Moor" was the subject of a parliamentary Enclosure Act. The Duke of Bridgewater was the biggest landowner in 1786, owning over half the land. At one time Walkden was the centre for coaling mines and textile manufacturing.

The Ellesmere Centre had a clock-tower which is a replica of the Lady Bourke Clock which once stood by the NCB Offices in Bridgewater Road. It was taken down when the Tesco store was erected. The original clock was used to alert coal miners to the beginning or end of their shifts. The workers claimed that they could not hear the clock strike once at 1 o'clock to mark the end of dinnertime and the resumption of the working day and it was altered to strike 13 times at 1.00pm, a tradition continued by the replica clock. The opening line of George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), referring to the clocks striking thirteen, might have been inspired by his time in the area writing The Road to Wigan Pier (1937).

The Ellesmere Monument in St Paul's Churchyard was erected in 1868 to commemorate Harriet (d. 1866), wife of the 1st Earl of Ellesmere. It was designed by T. G. Jackson, and inspired by the medieval Eleanor crosses. It originally stood at the junction of the A6, A575 and B5232 roads but was moved into the churchyard in 1968 to reduce traffic congestion. Statues of four angels on the monument were stolen. A project to restore the monument was completed in 2006. It was later rebuilt.

Walkden Town Hall was demolished in 1999, to create extra car parking spaces for Walkden College.