The reticulated python is the longest snake in the world, and large reticulated pythons are about 5 to 7 meters long. As of November 2026, zoo pages give 10 meters as the longest on record. As of November 2026, the Guinness World Records longest snake in captivity is Medusa, a captive reticulated python in Kansas City, Missouri. She measured 7.67 meters (25 ft 2 in) on 12 October 2011.

A study of more than 1,000 wild reticulated pythons from southern Sumatra found snakes that measured from 1.5 to over 6 meters in length and from 1 to 75 kilograms in mass. In that study, the largest males were about 5 meters long and 20 kilograms, and the largest females were about 7 meters long and 75 kilograms.

Reticulated pythons live from western Bangladesh to southeastern Vietnam and on islands to the south. They live in tropical forests, often near ponds, rivers and streams, and they prefer temperatures of about 24 to 34 degrees Celsius and high humidity. A python needs an area near a body of water, both for protection and for hunting success.

In Singapore, reticulated pythons move around the city through drainpipes and swim in canals. There they do not tend to grow as large as they do elsewhere, and they usually eat small mammals such as rats.

Reticulated pythons do not have ears; a small bone called the columella lets the python sense vibrations in the ground. A python is virtually deaf to airborne noises, so it relies on its sense of smell and touch. It smells by flicking its forked tongue to bring air particles to a vomeronasal organ on the roof of the mouth.

Only pit vipers, pythons and some boas have pit organs for sensing infrared, or heat. These heat-sensing pit organs let a python respond to heat even in complete darkness, working with vision or on their own.

A reticulated python hunts by waiting in ambush until food comes close. It has many sharp teeth that curve backwards, but it has no venom. Pythons are good swimmers and often spend time in water, where a large snake moves more easily and can hide while it waits for food. Young pythons spend a lot of time off the ground in trees and bushes, while large adults stay mostly on the ground.

In the Sumatra study, small reticulated pythons fed mostly on rats, and at 3 to 4 meters in body length they shifted to larger mammals such as pangolins, porcupines, monkeys, wild pigs and mouse deer. Bigger pythons of both sexes ate larger prey and ate more often than smaller ones. Documented prey of reticulated pythons include small bats, tree shrews and deer.

A reticulated python swallows its food whole. A snake has a very low metabolic rate, so it can go a long time between meals. In a zoo, large reticulated pythons are fed about 10 pounds of rabbits every 3 to 4 weeks.

One study of about 1,000 reticulated pythons from southern Sumatra measured clutch size, how often females breed and fat stores, and found strong links between body size and these traits. In another study, of 784 harvested pythons at four places in northern Sumatra, females laid large clutches (mean 24.2) of eggs each heavier than 250 grams, but bred only once every 2 to 4 years. The bigger a female python is, the more eggs she lays. Male pythons begin to breed at about 7 to 9 feet long, and females at about 11 feet long.

A clutch usually holds about 25 to 50 eggs, though in Singapore females lay clutches of 15 to 80 eggs. A female keeps the eggs warm by shivering, a process of muscle contractions called shivering thermogenesis that speeds incubation. A female can also store a male's sperm until climate conditions are better. The eggs hatch after about 80 to 90 days, and the mother guards them and defends them against predators.

Adult reticulated pythons are so big that they have few natural predators. As of September 2026, reticulated pythons have been commercially harvested in Malaysia and Indonesia for more than a century, with hundreds of thousands taken from the wild each year for meat, skins and medicine body parts. As of November 2026, the IUCN Red List lists the reticulated python as Least Concern.

A reticulated python must shed its skin as it grows, because it keeps growing throughout its life. In the wild, reticulated pythons live about 15 to 22 years. As of November 2026, the longest known lifespan of a reticulated python in captivity is 32 years, and the longest in the wild is 23 years.

Words to know

• infrared: heat energy
• columella: small ear bone
• incubation: egg warming
• ambush: wait to catch
• harvested: caught