🐆
Cheetah
Acinonyx jubatus
Carnivores · Vulnerable
vs
🐘
Elephant
Loxodonta africana
Mammals · Endangered
One clip names both of them
2.2 million views between them.
Elephant outweighs Cheetah 90× — 4,565 kg against 50.6 kg. Both figures are averages across males and females.
To scale
Grid at 1 m
1 m
2 m
3 m
Silhouettes: PhyloPic (CC0).
Cheetah
0.80 m
at the shoulder
Human
1.70 m
full standing height
for scale
Elephant
2.80 m
at the shoulder
Tale of the tape
Body mass
51 kg
🐆 Cheetah · COMBINE
4,565 kg
🐘 Elephant · COMBINE
Shoulder height
0.8 m
🐆 Cheetah
2.8 m
🐘 Elephant
Body length
1.49 m
🐆 Cheetah · COMBINE
7.5 m
🐘 Elephant · COMBINE
Top speed
104 km/h
🐆 Cheetah
25 km/h
🐘 Elephant
Bite force
472 N
🐆 Cheetah
no figure yet
🐘 Elephant
Maximum lifespan
20 yr
🐆 Cheetah · COMBINE
80 yr
🐘 Elephant · COMBINE
Bars are sized against the larger of the two figures. Bite force figures come from individual studies and vary a lot between sources.
Animals caught on camera
Real footage of the animals on this site — hunting, fighting, and getting on with it.
Shared ancestry
The closest group they share is Theria (subclass), home to 9,319 species.
They last shared an ancestor about 91 million years ago.
Estimates range from 78 to 117 million years; the figure above is the middle estimate.
About this estimate
Dates from Upham, Esselstyn & Jetz 2019, PLoS Biology 17:e3000494 (CC0).