Traditional events include the Moomba parade, crowning of Moomba monarchs, fireworks displays, carnivals in the gardens along the river, river activities including watersports, water floats and the Birdman Rally, as well as live music and bands.

In 2021, the usual Moomba was cancelled by Melbourne City Council, for the first time ever, due to events and issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia.

In 1951, Australia celebrated fifty years of Federation with a parade and the staging of the theatre production An Aboriginal Moomba: Out of the Dark.

Before the event's first year, controversy was created when Labor Councillor Frank Williams resigned from the committee, branding the planned carnival as a "Bourke street joke for the benefit of shopkeepers".

The festival was originally named Moomba by organisers in the belief it was a native word meaning 'let's get together and have fun.'

[4] In 1969 Luise Hercus glossed the word mum (rhyming with 'vroom')[5] as meaning 'bottom, rump', and suggested mum-ba meant something like 'bottom and..', and had been introduced from Healesville usage as a joke.

[6] In 1981 Barry Blake analysed the word as combining as mum (anus) and –ba, a locative suffix meaning 'at, in, on'.

[4] Some say he did it to get back at the city council for having deliberately upstaged the traditional Labour Day march with a popular carnival.

Lin Onus, his son, stated that indeed his father had intended to play a prank in passing on the word with this sense.

The first Moomba was heavily criticised by Melbourne's conservative establishment, including the Anglican Church, which at the time claimed it was hedonistic and embodying social decay.

[11] One of the popular events associated with Moomba was the Herald Sun Outdoor Art Show in the Treasury Gardens.

[12][13] After the 2016 Moomba festival fireworks there was a large-scale brawl in and around Federation Square in Melbourne's Central Business District, in which young people and the police fought each other.

The violence was blamed in the press on the supposed Apex, and became a trigger for the African gangs moral panic in the lead up to the Victorian state election of 2018.

[14] In 2021 the usual Moomba events were cancelled by Melbourne City Council, for the first time ever, due to COVID-19 restrictions and Victoria's third lockdown in February.

[16] A parade (or "procession") and floats through the streets of Melbourne have been a key part of the Moomba festival since its beginning.

In 2001, the parade came under media controversy when a French Troupe and Melbourne's Snuff Puppets had floats with naked people covered in body paint.

Among the more popular events is the Birdman Rally, begun in 1976, which is traditionally held at the Swan Street Bridge over the Yarra River.