Updated 20 October 2026

Best places to see lions in Uganda

Lions were once widespread across Uganda but have been reduced to a small number of protected populations by hunting, habitat loss and human-wildlife conflict. Today, reliable lion encounters are available in three parks, with one population — the tree-climbing lions of Queen Elizabeth’s Ishasha sector — unique in Africa. This is where to see lions in Uganda and what to expect.

1. Queen Elizabeth National Park — Ishasha sector

The Ishasha sector’s population of tree-climbing lions is the most famous lion attraction in Uganda and one of the most unusual in Africa. The lions habitually rest in large fig trees — sometimes five or six individuals in a single tree — and are visible from below by game drive vehicles. The behaviour is not unique to Ishasha (a small population in Tanzania’s Lake Manyara NP does the same) but Ishasha’s consistency of sightings and the accessibility of the area makes it the most reliable place in the world to see this phenomenon. Morning game drives from the Ishasha lodges produce tree-climbing lion sightings on approximately sixty percent of visits.

2. Queen Elizabeth National Park — Kasenyi area

The Kasenyi game drive circuit in the northern section of Queen Elizabeth NP is the main game drive area for the park’s larger lion population. The open grassland and Uganda kob herds provide the prey base; morning and evening game drives regularly produce lion sightings. The Kasenyi lions are the most accessible for visitors staying at Mweya Peninsula’s lodges and are the primary lion-sighting area for the park’s general visitor population.

3. Kidepo Valley National Park

Kidepo has a healthy lion population in the Narus Valley — typically easier to see than the Ishasha tree-climbers due to the open grassland habitat and the lions’ tendency to remain in predictable hunting areas near the permanent waterhole. Kidepo’s lions are less habituated to vehicles than the Queen Elizabeth population and therefore display more natural hunting behaviour. For visitors who reach Kidepo, lion encounters are among the most consistently produced wildlife events on a typical game drive.

4. Murchison Falls National Park

Murchison Falls has a resident lion population on the north bank of the Nile, though sightings are less consistent than in the two parks above. Lions are most reliably found in the early morning near the Albert Nile delta in the park’s northwest section — a longer game drive from Paraa that is typically offered as a specialist half-day outing rather than the standard game drive circuit. Sightings are rewarding when they occur but cannot be guaranteed.

Planning a lion-focused itinerary

The most practical lion-inclusive Uganda itinerary combines Bwindi gorilla trekking with Queen Elizabeth NP, entering the park through the Ishasha sector for the tree-climbing lion experience before moving to Mweya Peninsula for the Kazinga Channel boat cruise. Two nights in Ishasha and two nights at Mweya provide adequate time for both the tree-climbing lion search and the full Queen Elizabeth experience. The drive from Bwindi Buhoma to Ishasha takes three to four hours.

Uganda’s lion population, which had declined significantly during the Amin era’s wildlife collapse of the 1970s and 1980s, has recovered to approximately 400 to 500 individuals distributed across Queen Elizabeth, Murchison Falls, and Kidepo Valley national parks. The Queen Elizabeth population is notable for the Ishasha sector’s tree-climbing behaviour — documented since at least the 1950s and now sufficiently consistent to be considered a cultural tradition within that specific population. The Kidepo Valley population, in the remote northeast, is less habituated to vehicles than the more-visited parks’ lions and provides a more wild and unpredictable encounter that experienced Uganda visitors specifically seek as a contrast to the more reliable but more managed game viewing of Queen Elizabeth and Murchison.

Uganda’s lion population, concentrated primarily in Queen Elizabeth National Park and Murchison Falls National Park, is supplemented by smaller populations in Kidepo Valley and Lake Mburo, with the tree-climbing lions of the Ishasha sector in Queen Elizabeth providing the most photographed lion behaviour in the country. The tree-climbing behaviour — documented at Ishasha and at a small number of locations in the Serengeti — has been attributed to the same combination of factors in both locations: fig trees with low, spreading branches that provide a raised platform above ground-level insects and the thermal advantages of an elevated resting position on hot afternoons.