Here we show 60 mA bidirectional current gating in a two-terminal planar device based on a highly resistive vanadium dioxide (VO₂) thin film by harnessing photothermally induced phase transition occurred in VO₂ when irradiating the VO₂ film with a CO₂ laser oscillating at 10.6 μm. The VO₂ thin film was grown by a pulsed laser deposition method, and the two-terminal planar device was fabricated using the VO₂ film isolated with sub-millimeter dimensions. The bidirectional current gating between 0 and 60 mA was accomplished by irradiating the VO₂-based device with repetitive pulses of the CO₂ laser. In terms of laser modulation parameters such as the pulse width and repetition rate, their effect on the transient responses of laser-gated currents was also investigated. With a minimum energy per pulse of ~766 mJ, a stable bidirectional current gating of up to 60 mA could be successfully implemented for the repetition rates of 0.5-3.0 Hz in a VO₂ device biased at ~5.4 V, showing a switching contrast between off- and on-state currents of ~11089. This maximum onstate current (60 mA) and switching contrast are the highest values among previous gating results attained in VO₂ devices with a CO₂ laser.