外显子（英语：Exon）是真核生物基因的一部分，它在剪接后仍会被保存下来，并可在蛋白质生物合成过程中被表达为蛋白质。 而内含子则会在剪接过程中被除去。

所有的外显子一同组成了遗传信息，该信息会体现在蛋白质上。

剪接方式并不是唯一的（参看替代剪接），所以外显子只能在成体mRNA中被看出。即使是使用生物信息学方法，要精确预测外显子的位置也是非常困难的。

真核生物的基因，其线性表达被内含子阻断，这就是所谓的断裂基因（split gene），该现象的发现者Richard J. Roberts和Phillip A. Sharp获得了1993年诺贝尔奖。

An exon is any part of a gene that will become a part of the final mature RNA produced by that gene after introns have been removed by RNA splicing. The term exon refers to both the DNA sequence within a gene and to the corresponding sequence in RNA transcripts. In RNA splicing, introns are removed and exons are covalently joined to one another as part of generating the mature messenger RNA.