Asia’s largest deer, it feeds near forests and wetlands.
Its coat is dark brown to black. Males have a dense mane on the neck and branched antlers.
In China’s Gongga Mountain National Nature Reserve, researchers used nine years of camera-trap data from 493 sites to study sambar distribution. They recorded sambar at 153 valid presence sites and counted 5,203 independent captures. A habitat model estimated about 693 square kilometres of suitable area within the reserve.
Sambar activity peaked around 06:00–08:00 and 19:00–21:00. The comparison tufted deer (Elaphodus cephalophus) was also active around dawn and dusk, but peak times differed by season. The two species had 656.67 square kilometres of overlapping suitable habitat.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
The authors describe the nine-year camera-trap results on sambar and tufted deer as scientific information for conservation in the reserve and along the southeastern edge of the Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau.