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On the Border is the third studio album by American rock band the Eagles, released on March 22, 1974. Apart from two songs produced by Glyn Johns, it was produced by Bill Szymczyk because the group wanted a more rock‑oriented sound instead of the country rock feel of the first two albums. It is the first Eagles album to feature guitarist Don Felder. On the Border reached number 17 on the Billboard album chart and has sold two million copies. Three singles were released from the album: "Already Gone", "James Dean" and "Best of My Love". The singles peaked at numbers 32, 77 and 1 respectively. "Best of My Love" became the band's first of five chart toppers. The album also includes "My Man", Bernie Leadon's tribute to his deceased friend Gram Parsons. Leadon and Parsons had played together in the pioneer country rock band Flying Burrito Brothers, before Leadon joined the Eagles. This is the first album by the Eagles to be released in Quadraphonic surround sound. It was released on Quadraphonic 8 track tape and CD 4 LP. A hidden message carved into the run out groove of some vinyl LPs reads: "He who hesitates is lunch".

The album was initially produced by Glyn Johns and recorded at Olympic Studios in London, but during the making of the album, disagreement arose between the Eagles and Johns. As the band tried to lean towards a more hard rock sound, they felt that Johns was overemphasizing their country influenced rock sound. Johns however felt that the Eagles were not capable of what the band wanted and told the band: "You are not a rock and roll band, The Who is a rock and roll band, and you're not that." The band—Glenn Frey in particular, but not Don Henley—were also unhappy with the no drug policy of Johns during the recording; furthermore they did not feel at home recording in London. The band recorded the rest of the album at Criteria Studios in Miami Szymczyk suggested they bring in a harder edged guitarist to add slide guitar to the song "Good Day in Hell". Bernie Leadon suggested his old friend Don Felder, whom they had met and jammed with on a few occasions. The band was so impressed that they invited Felder to become the fifth Eagle. The only other track on this album on which he appeared was "Already Gone". They credited him as a late arrival on the album's liner notes. On the difference in sound between Johns' and Szymczyk's productions, Henley said: "There's a lot less echo with Bill, for one thing. There's more of a raw and funky presence. Glyn had a stamp he put on his records which is a deep echo that is really smooth like ice cream". He thought that the production on the two songs that Johns produced was good and necessary. Their friend and collaborator J. D. Souther ascribed the change of producer to "Eagles' desire to get more of a live, thin sound on the albums". The first two singles released were more rock oriented; Frey was reluctant to release the Johns produced "Best of My Love" as a single, and held off its release for some months. However, when it was finally released, the label had truncated the song–without the band's knowledge or approval–so that it would be more radio friendly. "Best of My Love" would become their biggest hit thus far, and their first No. 1 on the charts.

"Already Gone", "James Dean", and "Best of My Love" were released as singles from the album, and information on these songs can be found in their respective articles. The following are other noteworthy tracks from the album:

Bernie Leadon's "My Man" is a tribute to Gram Parsons, who had died of a drug overdose in September 1973. Leadon and Parsons had been members of the pioneering country rock band The Flying Burrito Brothers. In the lyrics, Leadon makes reference to Parsons' song "Hickory Wind" ("like a flower he bloomed till that old hickory wind called him home") which appeared on the Byrds' groundbreaking country rock album Sweetheart of the Rodeo in 1968, the only Byrds album Parsons appeared on.

A hard rock song, the track was inspired by the Watergate scandal and fears of the government overstepping its bounds and infringing on people's privacy. Barely audible at the end of the song, Glenn Frey can be heard whispering "Say Goodnight, Dick," a line made famous by Dan Rowan of Rowan and Martin but in this case referring to Richard Nixon's resignation. Nixon would indeed resign five months after the release of the album. Henley however judged the song they wrote a "clumsy, incoherent attempt" as they were still learning how to write. According to Henley, the song was supposed to be "an R&B type song" but missed the mark.

According to Henley, the song was written by Frey as a tribute to Danny Whitten and Gram Parsons. He also described the song as another of their "running commentaries on the perils of the music business and the lifestyle that often comes with it".

In an early review, Janet Maslin of Rolling Stone found the album "competent and commercial", but was disappointed that it did not live up to the potential for bigger things shown in Desperado. She also thought that with three guitarists in the band, there were "just too many intrusive guitar parts here, too many solos that smack of gratuitous heaviness. Many of the arrangements seem to lose touch with the material somewhere in mid song." Overall, she judged the album "a tight and likable collection, with nine potential singles working in its favor and only one dud ("Midnight Flyer") to weigh it down," and that it's "good enough to make up in high spirits what it lacks in purposefulness." William Ruhlmann of AllMusic noted in his retrospective review the R&B direction in its title track that would be pursued more fully in later albums, and considered the album "which looked back to their earlier work and anticipated their later work" to be "a transitional effort that combined even more styles than most of their records did." peaking at number 17 in its sixth week on the chart. The album was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) two and a half months after its release June 5, 1974, and it was then certified double platinum for shipments of 2 million copies on March 20, 2001.

Credits adapted from the liner notes.