Frosty the Snowman marked the final film role of comedian Jimmy Durante, who voiced the film's narrator.

The special was based on the 1950 song of the same name by Walter E. Rollins and Steve Nelson, and Jimmy Durante had been one of the first people to record that song when it was released, later re-recording it for the TV special.

Producers Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass wanted the show to look like a Christmas card, so they hired Paul Coker Jr., a greeting card and Mad magazine artist, to do the character and background drawings.

The animation was produced by Mushi Production in Tokyo, Japan, with Yusaku 'Steve' Nakagawa credited and Osamu Dezaki working uncredited among the animation staff.

Writer Romeo Muller, a Rankin/Bass veteran, adapted and expanded the story for television, having previously done similar work for the stop-motion special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

The special was ranked the No. 1 television program for the week of December 1-7, 1969 by Nielsen Media Research, earning a 30.5 rating and a 45 share, and aired annually on CBS for 55 years before NBC acquired the broadcast rights starting in 2024.

TV Guide ranked the special number 9 on its list of the 10 Best Family Holiday Specials.

In several sequels the character continued to evolve: Frosty's Winter Wonderland (1976) introduced Jack Frost as a new antagonist and replaced Durante with Andy Griffith as narrator after Durante retired following a stroke in 1972, while the CBS-produced Frosty Returns (1992), voiced by John Goodman, changed the character's appearance and gave him an environmentalist storyline unrelated to Christmas.