I know he has died a lot of times, just wondering how many in total.
This includes all comics, television series, movies, etc. but excludes Optimus Primal as he is not the Optimus Prime. Cheers.

 

Shows: G1 movie, Headmasters, Armada, Animated (never mind that he got revived within a minute), Revenge of the Fallen.

Spoiler

I don't count Prime due to a technicality.

Comics: someone else can fill this in

 

Too many times.

 

As far as the cartoons go, at least once in every series except Car Robots in Disguise. You may want to check out the TFWiki page for that.

http://tfwiki.net/wiki/The_many_deaths_of_Optimus_Prime

 

Might as well go here (and start counting)
The many deaths of Optimus Prime - Transformers Wiki

 

Even that page lists times where Optimus didn't die; it's like they're only on there because "hey, he's near death or we think he's dead, but he's really fine, but let's count it anyway."

 

Haha thanks for the link, guys. You can never go wrong with TFWiki.

 

At least once a tv series and movie series and more times then I can count in the comics

 

so many times that it has become a cliche.

 

Its Over 9000!!! [Original Video and Audio] - YouTube

 

I think Daniel Jackson from Stargate has "died" more than Optimus Prime.

 

Other people go to sleep, Optimus dies.

 

How many times has Optimus died? One more.

 

I've just add on the US Marvel comics - twice. Once in a computer game stimulation (no joke) and the other in the final battle with Unicron.

G2...I'm not sure if one would consider him killed by the swarm?

 

I don't see why you guys have a problem with Optimus dying. He's an Autobot willing to sacrifice his life for everyone else so he should prove it by letting himself get killed

 

Its not quite Kenny from South Park levels of silly but it has been cheapened by the fact everyone knows he will be back pretty soon. A question in my mind is, has he ever stayed dead? I dropped regeneration1 and I think he might have in that but I'm not sure. Can anyone verify if he has ever stayed dead?

 

Well ReGen One sort of ends with and later on everyone you ever loved, hated or didn't know existed in the Marvel G1 died, with Rodimus being the last (but it never ends)
So, officially, yeah. Whether behind the scenes he tried to end it quicker, someone misunderstood started another war ending with his resurrection, saving the day and slapping the fool who caused all that is a story for another day. Of course I don't know whether dying, coming back, dying, coming back and dying for good (?) counts.

 

Huh I'm surprised nobodys mentioned the pilot episode of Transformers, he lay dead (along with dveryone else) for millions of years before he was revived.

Edit
Reading through the TF Wiki entry it mentions a death where Optimus doesn't die because he downloaded his consciousness into his battle deck before he died, so he could be reborn later? Isn't that pretty much exactly what wizards do with Horcruxes?

... ... ...

OMFG, OPTIMUS PRIME IS LORD VOLDEMORT!

 

It makes me curious: will Optimus return at next RID cartoon?