Dumb Ways to Die is an Australian public awareness campaign video and media franchise made by Metro Trains in Melbourne, Victoria to promote railway safety.

The original cartoon public service announcement for the awareness campaign went viral on social media after it was released on the internet in November 2012, amassing over 320 million views on YouTube.

[3] John Mescall, executive creative director of McCann, said "The aim of this campaign is to engage an audience that really doesn't want to hear any kind of safety message, and we think dumb ways to die will.

The song "Dumb Ways to Die" from the video was written by John Mescall and co created with Patrick Baron, music by Ollie McGill from the Cat Empire, who also produced it.

[1] The band on the recording consists of Gavin Pearce on bass, Danny Farrugia on drums and Brett Wood on guitar.

[14][15] The game, developed by Julian Frost, Patrick Baron and Samuel Baird,[16] invites players to avoid the dangerous activities engaged in by the various characters featured throughout the campaign.

[30] Susie O'Brien in the Herald Sun in Melbourne criticised the ad for trivialising serious injuries and being about advertisers' ego rather than effective safety messages.

[31] Simon Crerar of the Herald Sun wrote that the song's "catchy chorus was the most arresting hook since PSY's Gangnam Style.

"[8] Alice Clarke writing in the Herald Sun described the video as "adorably morbid" and wrote that Victoria's public transport "broke its long running streak of terrible ads".

[33] Michelle Starr of CNET described the campaign as the Darwin Awards meets The Gashlycrumb Tinies and the song as "a cutesy indie-pop hit in the style of Feist".

[34] Logan Booker of Gizmodo described it as "taking a page out of the Happy Tree Friends book and mixing cute with horrifying".

[37] Arlene Paredes of the International Business Times said the video was "brilliant in getting viewers' attention" and "arguably one of the cutest PSAs ever made.

[39] Writing in Mumbrella in February 2013, a former employee of Victoria's Department of Infrastructure advised critical thinking when evaluating claims made regarding improvements to safety.

[40] In February 2013, Artemy Lebedev's blog was censored by Roskomnadzor, the Russian government agency in charge of Internet censorship, for including the video.

The song's lyrics contains a description of different ways of committing suicide, such as: using drugs beyond their expiration date, standing on an edge of a platform, running across the rails, eating superglue and other.

The campaign won seven Webby Awards in 2013 including the Best Animation Film & Video and Best Public Service & Activism (Social Content & Marketing).