The coordination compound cis-dichlorodiammineplatinum(II) (cis-DDP) was shown by Rosenberg et al. (17) to exhibit antitumour activity. Several authors have indicated limited virustatic properties of cis-DDP against bacterial, oncogenic, avipox and paramyxo viruses.In our investigations, cis-DDP significantly showed an antiviral action in vitro against enveloped DNA and RNA viruses, such as vaccinia, pseudorabies, herpes simplex type 1, Newcastle disease, influenza A/fowl plague, influenza A/Victoria 3/75, influenza A/Jena 48/78, influenza B/Johannesburg and vesicular stomatitis viruses. Out of the group of non-enveloped viruses, adenovirus type 4 and 5 were inhibited, whereas no inhibition against naked cardiovirus Mengo could be estimated.The antiviral action was proved against extracellular virus by dialysis experiments with vaccinia virus and also during the replication cycles of enveloped viruses. In trials with cell-free viruses the plaque reduction of all sensitive viruses mentioned above amounted up to 100 per cent in comparison to the untreated controls caused by virus inactivation with loss of infectivity in contact with several concentrations of cis-DDP.On the other hand, the addition of the compound for one hour only immediately after infection or up to 8 hrs later produced a complete depression of further multiplication of vaccinia virus. Likewise, the replication of influenza virus A/FPV or VSV was inhibited, whereas the multiplication of adenoviruses was not influenced in a comparable manner.