How to Tame a Megatherium in ARK

 

    The Megatherium — ark.wiki.gg glosses the name as "Great Beast" and says it is "usually called the Giant Sloth" — is a knockout (KO) tame. This guide follows exactly what the wiki's Megatherium page documents: how to trap and knock one out, which foods it prefers, the exact quantities and time required at six different wild levels, and what you get once it's tamed — saddle level, base stats, and its Insect Killer buff. Anywhere the source page doesn't give a figure, this guide says so instead of guessing.

 

Trapping and Knocking Out a Megatherium

 

    The Domestication table confirms the Megatherium is Tameable, Rideable, and Breedable — all "Yes" — but not Torpor Immune ("No"), with a Taming Method of simply Knockout. That reads oddly next to the in-game dossier, quoted here verbatim since the exact wording is the evidence: "Because of its size and girth, the Megatherium is uncommonly resistant to being knocked unconscious." So it isn't torpor-immune, but Helena Walker's dossier flags it as unusually tough to knock out for its size — flavor text, not a numeric spec; the page attaches no multiplier to it.

 

    For the trap itself, the KO Strategy section reads: "Build a small pen with stone pillars and metal fence foundations or a stone taming pen to safely knock it out, be careful of fighting Megatheriums near cliffs as they can knock you off the edge." That materials note matters — the page's Can Damage list for this creature includes Thatch, Greenhouse, and Wood, so a wooden or thatch pen risks getting broken open mid-tame. To immobilize rather than fully pen it, the page lists it as Immobilized By: Chain Bola, Large Bear Trap, and Net Projectile. No exact coordinates or spawn density are given for any specific map, so this guide doesn't invent a location — the habitat table lists it across The Island, The Center, Scorched Earth, Ragnarok, Extinction, Valguero, Genesis: Part 1, Crystal Isles, Genesis: Part 2, Lost Island, and Fjordur, as a general range, not a pin.

 

Best Foods for Taming a Megatherium

 

 

    The Domestication table lists a Preferred Food of Giant Bee Honey. For kibble, the extracted page text shows two separate "Preferred Kibble" entries back to back — Superior Kibble and Kibble (Baryonyx Egg) — with no version label attached to either as captured here; this guide states both as documented rather than guessing which is meant for Evolved versus Ascended.

 

    Beyond the named preferred items, the Level 1 taming-food table lists food in this order: Superior Kibble, Raw Mutton, Giant Bee Honey, Cooked Lamb Chop, Raw Prime Meat, Cooked Prime Meat, Raw Prime Fish Meat, Raw Meat, Cooked Prime Fish Meat, Mejoberry, Cooked Meat, Berries, Raw Fish Meat, and Cooked Fish Meat — exactly as it appears in the source, not re-ranked. Scope note: the wiki explicitly headers this whole quantity/time table "ARK: Survival Evolved," so treat the specific numbers in it and the next section as ASE-sourced; no separately labeled ASA version of this table was captured here.

 

    Superior Kibble's own ingredient list, given directly: 2× Citronal, 1× Prime Meat Jerky, 1× Large Egg, 5× Fiber, 2× Rare Mushroom, 1× Sap, 1× Water.

 

Taming Quantities and Time by Level

 

 

    Following Superior Kibble across the ASE-labeled table by wild level: Level 1 — 4 kibble, 0:07:31; Level 30 — 6, 0:11:16; Level 60 — 8, 0:15:01; Level 90 — 11, 0:20:39; Level 120 — 13, 0:24:24; Level 150 — 16, 0:30:01. The arithmetic: from Level 1 to Level 150 the kibble requirement quadruples (16 ÷ 4 = 4), and feeding time tracks almost exactly the same multiple — 451 seconds becomes 1,801 seconds, and 1,801 ÷ 451 ≈ 3.99, essentially a 4× increase alongside the quantity.

 

    The table also gives a torpidity-depletion rate and "time until all torpidity is depleted" per level — your window before induced torpor fully wears off if you stop adding to it. Level 1: 0.9/s, 00:18:31. Level 150: 3.11/s, 00:53:20. The window itself only grows about 2.88× (53:20 ÷ 18:31) even though the depletion rate alone grows about 3.46× (3.11 ÷ 0.9), because the higher-level creature's much larger torpor pool partly offsets its faster drain. The source doesn't cover torpor behavior once the creature is actually unconscious and being fed, so this guide doesn't extend the math past what's documented.

 

Base Stats, Abilities, and What You Get

 

 

    Once tamed, the Megatherium takes the Megatherium Saddle, unlocking at Level 52 per the Equipment field. The base-stats table (no version split noted here, unlike the food table above) gives: Health 740 (+148/level wild), Stamina 400 (+40/level), Oxygen 270 (+27/level), Food 3000 (+300/level), Weight 725 (+14.5/level), Melee Damage 32 (+1.6/level), and Torpidity 1000 (+60/level). A kill nets 16 XP, and its Drag Weight is 295.

 

    Its Active abilities, quoted from the page: "Melee — The Megatherium bites or slaps the target for 32 damage. Can be used every 0.67s," and "Slam — The Megatherium slams the target for 49 damage. This attack cannot be used while moving. Can be used every 0.67s." Its headline Passive is the Insect Killer buff: the Megatherium "deals 50% more damage to insects by default," and on killing one gains a 120-second buff that "increases Melee Damage output by 150% (stacking with the bonus above to 375% of base output against insects); and reduces incoming damage by 75%." Damage Multipliers list the Head at x1.5, and on ARK: Survival Ascended specifically, "body multipliers also apply for player's melee attacks."

 

Pen it in stone pillars and metal fence foundations (or a stone taming pen) before you start shooting — Thatch, Greenhouse, and Wood are all things it can damage, so anything flimsier risks breaking mid-tame. Stay off cliff edges; the wiki warns it "can knock you off the edge." Once tamed, remember Insect Killer only lasts 120 seconds per kill — the page's own combat notes describe a buffed Megatherium's 75% damage reduction turning a tranq arrow's 35 damage into roughly 8, so don't assume a "safe" hit lands the same once that buff is up.

 

Running your own ARK server

 

    Building a stone-and-metal pen, stockpiling Superior Kibble ingredients, and sitting through an 18-to-53-minute torpor window all go smoother on a dedicated, always-on world than a public server where your pen — or your target Megatherium — might be gone by the time you're back online. A private ARK server keeps your trap standing, your Citronal and Rare Mushroom stockpile in the box, and your half-tamed Megatherium exactly where you left it, with no other tribe able to grief the attempt mid-tame.

 

    Use promo code WELCOME on your first month of a gamever ARK server to get taming without racing anyone else's clock.

 

Conclusion

 

    Taming a Megatherium comes down to what the wiki documents: pen it in stone or metal, feed it Superior Kibble or Kibble (Baryonyx Egg) if you have either, Giant Bee Honey or Raw Mutton if you don't, and budget your torpor window — roughly 18 minutes at Level 1 up to roughly 53 minutes at Level 150. Once it's yours, the Level 52 saddle and the 120-second Insect Killer buff (375% damage against bugs, 75% less incoming damage) are what make it worth the trouble. What the source page doesn't spell out — exact spawn coordinates, ASA-specific taming-table figures, and torpor behavior once the creature is unconscious — isn't guessed at here.