How High Can A Frog Jump? (And How They Do It)

Recently, I wanted to know how high a frog can jump. Not only that, I wanted to know how they jump, whether they can jump out of the water, how they move and more. So, I did some research and learnt all about the way a frog jumps around.

So, how high can a frog jump? How high frogs can jump depends on the species. But frogs can generally jump at least 2 times their own height. The better jumpers (tree frogs for example) can jump up to 10 times their height. Frogs are much more known for the length of their jump.

How high can a frog jump?

As I said earlier, frogs are known for the length of their jump, not the height. That is why there isn’t much information about the height of the jump.

But this doesn’t mean we can’t say anything about it. Me, personally, have been chasing frogs for a very long time and from my own experience, I can say that most frogs can jump at least two times their own height.

Not surprising is the fact that frogs that are smaller (and therefore lighter) can jump higher. I have seen a tree frog that jumped about 10 times his own height (this is not an exaggeration).

How far can a frog jump?

How far a frog can jump is different for every species. Every species have other structures to make it easier or harder to jump far. But in general, we can say that many frogs jump at least 30 times their body length and some smaller tree frogs can jump up to 50 times their body weight. I don’t know about you, but I find that fact amazing!

Now here is something that you probably didn’t know. In the genus Rhacophorus, flying or gliding frogs of Asia can go jump even longer distances than the ones I mentioned above.

This is because these frogs have webbed toes and use these as a parachute to slow down their fall and sort of glide from one object to the next.

How does a frog jump?

It is a common misconception that frogs can jump greatly because of their strong leg muscles. This is a misconception because the leg muscles of a frog are not as powerful as they would need to be to jump far and to jump high.

The secret of a frog jumping lies in the tendons. It turns out that when a frog prepares himself for a jump, his tendons stretch out as much as they can. At this point, the muscles in the legs shorten and therefore transferring energy into the tendons.

When the energy is transferred, the frog then jumps and the tendons recoil just like a spring. This flexible structure is also the secret to why a frog jumps as far as it does.

Scientists searched a long time to find out how frogs jump as high and far as they do, and it was researcher Henry Astley who came up with the answer to this.

What he and his colleagues did was the following: They were able to film a frog at 500 frames per second and this way they could see how a frog jumps. But that is not the only thing they did.

They also filmed the frog with X-ray cameras and found out that the tendons are vital to the jump of a frog.

Fun fact: Did you know that almost a quarter of a frog’s weight is in its legs? And this all is so that the frog is able to jump the way he does.

You may also like to read about Why do frogs croak? (And how do frogs croak?)

Do frogs hop or jump?

When it comes to whether frogs hop or jump, there is a difference between long-legged frogs and short legged frogs.

Long-legged frogs mostly jump because their legs allow them to cover large distances in the air. This means it is the quickest way to go from A to B and escape predators.

Short legged frogs, however, can’t jump as far. Instead, they hop short distances. Most toads are also better at hopping short distances than they are at jumping.

Can a frog jump out of water?

Yes, a frog can jump out of the water. and need to do so to hunt for prey and to breed with a female because this can’t be done in the water.

If you have a pond with vertical sides, it can be hard for frogs to get out of the water and you need to help them a little.

If you don’t you’ll see that the frogs will be clawing at the sides of the pond but can’t get out, starve and drown. Below are 2 tips to help frogs get out of the water.

Tip #1
I would recommend building some sort of ramp so that the frogs can come out of the water. You can do this by putting a strip of expanded metal down into the pond so that the frogs can come out.

If you would like a more natural look, you can stick a long piece of driftwood in the water and the frogs can climb on that and out of the pond.

Tip #2
If you don’t have any wood or something else to put in the water at an angle, you can always put in a rock near the edge of the pond for frogs to climb on. This way they can jump on the rock and from the rock they can go up to the land.

Fun fact: If humans could jump 50 times their body length, they could jump the length of a football field. This is without a running start.

For further reading An article about frogs screams Why Do Frogs Scream? (Find The Answers Inside)

Why do frogs jump?

Most frogs jump to keep themselves safe. As you now know, most frogs can jump fairly far and aren’t any good at walking. This means that the easiest way to get away from predators or other danger is to jump.

Frogs don’t just jump and hope to get away from the predator, no, they even jump in a zigzag pattern which makes escaping the danger even easier. It leaves the other animals who are chasing the frog confused.

How do frogs move?

First of all, this is a very difficult question. This is a difficult question because some frogs move differently than others. If we look at toads, for example, we see that they hop from one place to the next.

But when we look at the flying tree frog, we see that he climbs to a high point in a tree and then “glides” to the next space. But in general, we can look at 2 movements.

1) The times that a frog is in the water and needs to swim
2) The times where the frog is on the land and need to go from one place to the next.

First, let’s look at number 1.
When a frog is in the water, they are using their powerful hind legs and their webbed feed to push them through the water.

Number 2.
When a frog is on land, he uses his very strong hind legs to jump to where he wants to go.