African wild dogs hunt together as a team, in packs, and a study that fitted a whole pack of wild dogs with collars found individual dogs ran independently of other pack members, took on no particular roles, and never ran relays. The study of a pack in Botswana's Okavango Delta found the energy return from group hunting and feeding substantially outweighs the cost of multiple short chases, and that sharing kills offsets each dog's higher individual gain.

Researchers fitted every dog in one pack of six adults in the Okavango Delta with GPS and motion collars and recorded 1,119 valid chases. Collars on the study pack recorded 300 readings a second of motion and 5 a second of position while the dogs ran. The dogs made an average of 2.43 chases per dog per day, and the average chase covered about 447 meters. In the Okavango Delta study area, over 80 percent of the prey that African wild dogs capture is impala, but the paper takes this from earlier work and the collars did not record prey.

The collars measured a top running speed of 68.4 kilometers per hour (19 meters per second) in a chase. The study pack traveled about 13.2 kilometers a day on average, and wild dogs cover double the distance of cheetahs each day, the Botswana study reported.

Wild dogs gather for greeting ceremonies called social rallies, and one study looked at their sneezes. In that sneeze study, the more sneezes during a rally, the more likely the pack was to leave, and the sneezes acted like a quorum. Before the sneeze study, it was thought that wild dogs were just clearing their airways when they sneezed. Researchers cannot be sure the sneezes mean yes to a hunt, and a wild dog expert wants more research to confirm the sneezing is not just a response to other cues. Scientists also do not yet know what a wild dog's one-of-a-kind coat pattern is for. It may help concealment, communication or keeping cool.

A genome study found the African wild dog the most specialized of the canids, the dog family, it compared for cursorial adaptations, the body features for running. It dated the changes it found in the wild dog's genes to about 1.7 million years ago, matching the diversification of large-bodied ungulates (hoofed animals). It also found changes in genes linked to the sonic hedgehog pathway that may alter the cusps on a wild dog's molar teeth, a possible mechanism for its meat-cutting teeth.

Three brothers from the Mayukuyuku Pack left Zambia's Kafue National Park in July 2025, and by 1 April 2026 had traveled 4,126 kilometers with GPS collars before settling in a new range. As of November 2026, the journey shows how far wild dogs can go, but travel between populations is not enough on its own to guarantee genetic or demographic connectivity between them.

A pack of 14 wild dogs was returned to Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique in 2018, and a report says 29 pups were born in 2019. As of November 2026, the report says 68 percent of the park is currently unused by wild dogs.

Words to know

• relays: taking turns
• connectivity: links between groups
• canids: dog family
• cursorial: built for running
• quorum: enough votes