This invention relates to a metal vapor laser having a discharge tube. The laser of the invention is provided with a second pulse circuit (16) which generates a second pulse voltage after a predetermined delay time of the generation of a first pulse voltage and is provided separately from the first pulse circuit (200) which generates the first pulse voltage performing lasing. After the first pulse voltage is applied to a discharge tube, the second pulse voltage is applied to the discharge tube and the output voltage of the second pulse circuit (16) is set to be lower than that of the first pulse circuit (200), so that relaxation from a lower level to a base reference level is promoted for each pulse, inversion distribution at the next pulse is made more complete and high efficiency can be obtained even when the number of pulse repetitions is large.
