This research examined the impact of international trade on Nigeria’s economic growth using time series data from 1980 to 2023 obtained from World Bank statistics. The examination used the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. The ADF test, an abbreviation for Augmented Dickey-Fuller test, is used for detecting unit roots. Moreover, the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) functions as the estimation technique. The Autoregressive Distributed Lagged bound test was used to determine the long-term relationships among exports, imports, and economic growth. The stationarity test revealed that the two variables, EXPT and INFR, were stationary at level, with values of -3.133712 exceeding -2.518090 and -4.210863 surpassing -3.518090. The remaining three variables, GDP, IMPT, and EXCR, exhibited non-stationarity at level (-2.133712, -2.888957, and -2.744781). The ARDL findings demonstrate that export trade (EXPT) has a significant beneficial impact (3.5%) on long-term economic growth. Similarly, the inflation rate (INFR) had a little beneficial impact (0.9%) on long-term economic growth. The research indicated that import trade (IMPT) and exchange rate (EXCR) had significant negative impacts of 2.0% and 2.4%, respectively, on long-term economic growth. Consequently, the following suggestions were put forth: The government need to establish and promote an export development plan, performing an unbiased assessment to facilitate more accessible and economical entrance into the export industry, hence augmenting its beneficial impact on Nigeria’s economic growth. The importation of commodities must be assessed to ensure it comprises just industrial inputs rather than domestic consumables, so enhancing the productivity of Nigeria’s industrial sectors for optimum output that might stimulate economic growth via exports.