Elephants live in both Africa and Asia and are classified by where they live. African elephants are found in 37 countries located south of the Saharan Desert, while Asian elephants roam Southeast Asia, China, Sri Lanka and India.
Although there were millions of African elephants and around 100,000 Asian elephants at the turn of the century, in 2015, habitat loss and poaching has greatly reduced their numbers. Only around 450,000 to 700,000 African elephants and up to 40,000 Asian elephants remain. This has led to the status of “endangered” for both types of elephants under the Endangered Species Act, and a status of “near threatened” under the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List.
