# PanAf20K: A Large Video Dataset for Wild Ape Detection and Behaviour Recognition

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.13554 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.13554/

## Key facts

- Cited by 22 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 31 of its 64 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 24 Jan 2024.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 31)

- [Microsoft COCO: Common Objects in Context](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1405.0312/) (2014)
- [Swin Transformer: Hierarchical Vision Transformer using Shifted Windows](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.14030/) (2021)
- [A ConvNet for the 2020s](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.03545/) (2022)
- [Quo Vadis, Action Recognition? A New Model and the Kinetics Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.07750/) (2017)
- [YOLOv3: An Incremental Improvement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.02767/) (2018)
- [The Kinetics Human Action Video Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.06950/) (2017)
- [Is Space-Time Attention All You Need for Video Understanding?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.05095/) (2021)
- [YOLO9000: Better, Faster, Stronger](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.08242/) (2016)
- [Class-Balanced Loss Based on Effective Number of Samples](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1901.05555/) (2019)
- [A Closer Look at Spatiotemporal Convolutions for Action Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.11248/) (2017)
- [Two-Stream Convolutional Networks for Action Recognition in Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1406.2199/) (2014)
- [Large-Scale Long-Tailed Recognition in an Open World](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.05160/) (2019)
- [X3D: Expanding Architectures for Efficient Video Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.04730/) (2020)
- [Long-tail learning via logit adjustment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2007.07314/) (2020)
- [MViTv2: Improved Multiscale Vision Transformers for Classification and Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.01526/) (2021)
- [Observation-Centric SORT: Rethinking SORT for Robust Multi-Object Tracking](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.14360/) (2022)
- [VarifocalNet: An IoU-aware Dense Object Detector](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.13367/) (2020)
- [Learning Spatio-Temporal Features with 3D Residual Networks for Action Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1708.07632/) (2017)
- [Large Scale Fine-Grained Categorization and Domain-Specific Transfer Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1806.06193/) (2018)
- [Seeing biodiversity: perspectives in machine learning for wildlife conservation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2110.12951/) (2021)
- [Long-Tailed Recognition via Weight Balancing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.14197/) (2022)
- [Animal Kingdom: A Large and Diverse Dataset for Animal Behavior Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.08129/) (2022)
- [Efficient Pipeline for Camera Trap Image Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1907.06772/) (2019)
- [The iWildCam 2021 Competition Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.03494/) (2021)
- [MammalNet: A Large-scale Video Benchmark for Mammal Recognition and Behavior Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.00576/) (2023)
- [Use Your Head: Improving Long-Tail Video Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.01143/) (2023)
- [Visual Recognition of Great Ape Behaviours in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.10759/) (2020)
- [Triple-stream Deep Metric Learning of Great Ape Behavioural Actions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.02642/) (2023)
- [Great Ape Detection in Challenging Jungle Camera Trap Footage via Attention-Based Spatial and Temporal Feature Blending](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.11240/) (2019)
- [Dynamic Curriculum Learning for Great Ape Detection in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.00275/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 22 of 22)

- [BaboonLand Dataset: Tracking Primates in the Wild and Automating Behaviour Recognition from Drone Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.17698/) (2024)
- [MammAlps: A multi-view video behavior monitoring dataset of wild mammals in the Swiss Alps](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.18223/) (2025)
- [Computer Vision for Primate Behavior Analysis in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.16424/) (2024)
- [The SA-FARI Dataset: Segment Anything in Footage of Animals for Recognition and Identification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.15622/) (2025)
- [AlphaChimp: Tracking and Behavior Recognition of Chimpanzees](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.17136/) (2024)
- [The PanAf-FGBG Dataset: Understanding the Impact of Backgrounds in Wildlife Behaviour Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.21201/) (2025)
- [WildLive: Near Real-time Visual Wildlife Tracking onboard UAVs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.10165/) (2025)
- [Self-supervised Learning on Camera Trap Footage Yields a Strong Universal Face Embedder](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.10552/) (2025)
- [GorillaWatch: An Automated System for In-the-Wild Gorilla Re-Identification and Population Monitoring](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.07776/) (2025)
- [Domain-Adaptive Pretraining Improves Primate Behavior Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.12193/) (2025)
- [PriVi: Towards A General-Purpose Video Model For Primate Behavior In The Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.09675/) (2025)
- [Towards Application-Specific Evaluation of Vision Models: Case Studies in Ecology and Biology](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.02825/) (2025)
- [Fine-Tuning Video-Text Contrastive Model for Primate Behavior Retrieval from Unlabeled Raw Videos](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.05681/) (2025)
- [SiLVi: Simple Interface for Labeling Video Interactions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.03819/) (2025)
- [BigMaQ: A Big Macaque Motion and Animation Dataset Bridging Image and 3D Pose Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.19874/) (2026)
- [Prompting-MammAlps: Fine-Grained Text-to-Video Retrieval for Camera-Trap Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.09876/) (2026)
- [From Forest to Zoo: Great Ape Behavior Recognition with ChimpBehave](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.20025/) (2024)
- [Mouse Lockbox Dataset: Behavior Recognition for Mice Solving Lockboxes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.15408/) (2025)
- [Zero-Shot Multi-Animal Tracking in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.02591/) (2025)
- [CHIRP dataset: towards long-term, individual-level, behavioral monitoring of bird populations in the wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.25524/) (2026)
- [Automating Visual Recognition of Leprosy in Wild Chimpanzees](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.17395/) (2026)
- [The PanAf-SBR Dataset: Social Behaviour Recognition for Wild Great Apes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.17399/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We present the PanAf20K dataset, the largest and most diverse open-access annotated video dataset of great apes in their natural environment. It comprises more than 7 million frames across ~20,000 camera trap videos of chimpanzees and gorillas collected at 14 field sites in tropical Africa as part of the Pan African Programme: The Cultured Chimpanzee. The footage is accompanied by a rich set of annotations and benchmarks making it suitable for training and testing a variety of challenging and ecologically important computer vision tasks including ape detection and behaviour recognition. Furthering AI analysis of camera trap information is critical given the International Union for Conservation of Nature now lists all species in the great ape family as either Endangered or Critically Endangered. We hope the dataset can form a solid basis for engagement of the AI community to improve performance, efficiency, and result interpretation in order to support assessments of great ape presence, abundance, distribution, and behaviour and thereby aid conservation efforts.