The installation of binocular vision at the end of a manipulator reduces its availability in environments with obstacles. To deal with the problem, this study puts forward a target localization method using a laser and the monocular hand-eye vision. In the proposed method, the centre of the laser spot is obtained by the hand-eye vision, and the geometric relations among the laser emission point, light-spot and the optical axis of the camera are used to calculate the distance. Then, the D-H method is employed to construct the coordinate conversion system, so that the location of the target can be calculated. The measuring precision is negatively correlated with the distance, and it is suitable for the measurement in medium or short distance. Compared with the commonly used binocular measurement methods, the proposed method uses fewer cameras, which reduces the width of the measurement system on manipulators, and makes it more applicable to narrow workspace. Moreover, it also improves the effective load capacity of manipulators.