Plan your safari
Elephant herd walking in a line across the Serengeti plains beside an acacia tree

African Elephant Facts & Where to See Them

The African elephant: the largest land animal on earth, and one of the most intelligent.

Plan your safari Highlights

The African bush elephant is the largest land animal alive: bulls stand up to 13 feet at the shoulder and weigh up to 7 tons, eating around 300lbs of vegetation a day. Their tusks are elongated teeth. In addition, their trunk, with over 40,000 muscles, is strong enough to push over a tree and precise enough to pick up a single seed pod.

Elephant society is matriarchal: herds of related females and calves follow the memory of the oldest cow to water and food across decades-old routes, while adult bulls range alone or in loose bachelor groups. They also mourn their dead, recognize themselves and communicate through rumbles too low for humans to hear. That is why watching a breeding herd at a waterhole is among safari’s most moving hours.

Highlights of the African elephant

The largest land animal

Bulls stand up to 13ft at the shoulder and weigh up to 7 tons, eating around 300lbs of vegetation a day.

The matriarch’s memory

Herds of related females follow the oldest cow’s mental map of water and food, learned over a lifetime.

A trunk like no other

40,000+ muscles: snorkel, arm, trumpet and greeting in one, and precise enough to pick up a single seed pod.

Emotional intelligence

Elephants mourn their dead, recognize themselves, and communicate in rumbles below human hearing.

Ecosystem engineers

They open woodland, dig waterholes and spread seeds — whole landscapes depend on them.

Where to see them

Chobe sits at the heart of Africa’s largest elephant population; Tarangire and Amboseli offer huge herds and famous tuskers.

Explore Where to see them →
An African elephant cow standing over her calf in tall green grass

A cow and her calf. Elephant herds are led by females, and the matriarch is the one who remembers the way

Best time to see African elephants

May–Oct

Dry season, when hundreds gather along the Chobe and Tarangire rivers.

Jun–Oct

Amboseli’s big tuskers against Kilimanjaro: the classic photograph.

Quieter seasons, considered

In the green months, however, rates ease at many of these camps, the plains empty of vehicles and the light turns dramatic. We also set out what each season gives, and what it trades, in our Safari Planning Guide.

Planning a safari to see elephants

Safari cost

Priced to your budget, and built around your camps, the season and how you like to travel. There are no fixed packages.

How we travel

In short, we design every journey privately, with private guides and vehicles arranged where specified, the finest lodges, and a specialist on call throughout. At fly-in camps, game drives may be shared unless a private vehicle is reserved.

Where and when to see elephants

In fact, Africa has two elephant species: the savanna elephant of the open plains and woodlands, which is the one you see on safari, and the smaller forest elephant of the Central and West African rainforests. Since 2021 the IUCN Red List has classed the savanna elephant as Endangered and the forest elephant as Critically Endangered.

The dry season, roughly June to October in East and Southern Africa, is when elephants gather most visibly around the remaining water. Above all, Botswana holds the largest elephant population of any country, and the Chobe riverfront fills with herds coming down to drink and swim in the afternoons. Tarangire is the East African equivalent, with big dry-season herds along the Tarangire River, and Amboseli puts elephant families in front of Kilimanjaro.

The oldest female, the matriarch, leads each herd of related females and their young; males, however, leave in their teens and live alone or in loose bachelor groups. In Amboseli the same families have been studied continuously since 1972, one reason the elephants there are so relaxed around vehicles.

The African Elephant FAQs

Botswana holds the largest elephant population on earth, and Chobe National Park is where it gathers most visibly. Tanzania’s Tarangire and Kenya’s Amboseli are just as rewarding, with some of Africa’s last great tuskers.

Bulls reach 10–13 feet at the shoulder and 6–7 tons; cows are smaller. Calves weigh around 200lbs at birth after a 22-month pregnancy, the longest of any mammal.

Elephants are generally peaceful but demand respect. So guides read ear postures and body language and always give herds right of way. In camp corridors, staff escort you if elephants wander through.

Plan a safari to see elephants.

So we can shape a private African elephant safari around the herds, the season and the light.

Then tell us how you like to travel and start with a complimentary consultation.

Plan your safari

For each species’ current conservation status, see the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.