The Smurfs is a Belgian Comic Franchise centered on a fictional colony of small, blue, human-like creatures who live in mushroom-shaped houses in the forest. The Smurfs was first created and introduced as a series of comic characters by the Belgian comics artist Peyo in 1958, wherein they were known as Les Schtroumpfs. There are more than 100 Smurf characters, and their names are based on adjectives that emphasize their characteristics, such as "Jokey Smurf", who likes to play practical jokes on his fellow smurfs. "Smurfette" was the first female Smurf to be introduced in the series. The Smurfs wear Phrygian caps, which came to represent freedom during the modern era. The word “smurf” is the original Dutch translation of the French "schtroumpf", which, according to Peyo, is a word he invented during a meal with fellow cartoonist André Franquin when he could not remember the word salt. The Smurfs franchise began as a comic and expanded into advertising, films, TV series, Ice Capades, video games, theme parks, and dolls.

The Smurfs animation actually began on the big screen. In 1965, a black-and-white 87-minute animated film called Les Aventures des Schtroumpfs was released in theaters in Belgium. It consisted of five short cartoons made in the previous years for broadcasting on Walloon TV. German copies and copies with Dutch subtitles are known to exist. The stories were based on existing Smurf stories like The Black Smurfs and The Smurfs and the Egg, and were created by writer Maurice Rosy and artist Eddy Ryssack from the small Dupuis animation studios. In total, ten animated shorts were created between 1961 and 1967, the first series in black and white and the later ones in color.

The Smurfs full length animated film was released in 1976 in Belgium titled La Flûte à six schtroumpfs (an adaptation of the original "Johan et Pirlouit" story). Michel Legrand provided the musical score to the film. The film would be released in the United States in 1983 (after the animated series became popular there) in an English language dubbed version titled The Smurfs and the Magic Flute. A few more full-length Smurf films were made, most notably The Baby Smurf and Here are the Smurfs, created from episodes of the Hanna-Barbera television cartoon series. Sony Pictures began a trilogy of live-action/computer-animated Smurf films, with the first film released on July 29, 2011. The project had been in various stages of development since 2003.

In June 2008, it was announced that Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation had acquired film rights for The Smurfs from Lafig Belgium. Jordan Kerner produced the film, with the screenwriters including Shrek 2 and Shrek the Third screenwriters J. David Stem and David N. Weiss. The film stars Jonathan Winters as Papa Smurf, Katy Perry as Smurfette, George Lopez as Grouchy Smurf, Gary Basaraba as Hefty Smurf, John Oliver as Vanity Smurf, Alan Cumming as Gutsy Smurf, Paul Reubens as Jokey Smurf, Hank Azaria as Gargamel, Neil Patrick Harris as Patrick Winslow and Jayma Mays as Grace Winslow, a couple in New York who help the Smurfs get back to their village. It was suggested that Quentin Tarantino would play Brainy Smurf, but this "didn't work out" so Fred Armisen voices Brainy instead. A CGI/traditionally animated mini-film, titled The Smurfs: A Christmas Carol, was released on December 2, 2011, on The Smurfs DVD and Blu-ray. A sequel to The Smurfs, titled The Smurfs 2, was released on July 31, 2013. A fully animated Smurfs reboot film, Smurfs: The Lost Village, was released in April 7, 2017, with Demi Lovato starring as Smurfette.

The Smurfs secured their place in North American pop culture in 1981, when the Saturday-morning cartoon series The Smurfs, produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions in association with SEPP International S.A.R.L, aired on NBC from September 12, 1981 to December 2, 1989 (reruns until August 25, 1990). The show continued to air on the USA network until 1993, and on Cartoon Network until 2003. The Smurfs is still broadcast on the Boomerang channel throughout the United States. The show became a major success for NBC, spawning spin-off television specials on an almost yearly basis. The Smurfs was nominated multiple times for Daytime Emmy awards, and won Outstanding Children's Entertainment Series in 1982–1983.

The Smurfs television show enjoyed continued success until 1990, when, after nearly a decade of success, NBC cancelled it due to decreasing ratings and plans to extend their Today morning show franchise to create a Saturday edition, although they did not do so until 1992 (two years later). The decreased ratings were the result of the network changing the format of the show, resulting in the final season featuring regular time travel with only a few Smurfs. In the TV series, many classical masterpieces are used as background music during the episodes, among them Franz Schubert's Unfinished Symphony (Symphony No. 8 in B minor), Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt and Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition.[ Reruns of the show are played on the Cartoon Network's sister channel Boomerang.

The Smurfs was named the 97th best animated series by IGN. It was called "kiddie cocaine" for people growing up during the 1980's. On August 31, 2017 it was announced that IMPS and Dupuis Audiovisuel would be working on the new Smurfs TV series with CGI animation. The series is scheduled for 2020 and is co produced by Ketnet (Flanders), TF1 (France), KiKa (Germany), OUFTIVI (Wallonia), Peyo Productions and Dupuis Audiovisuel (the TV branch of the comics publisher). It will show new stories, not adaptations of comics or other older stories.