The tufted deer (Elaphodus cephalophus), a rare ungulate species endemic to China, faces mounting conservation concerns due to habitat fragmentation, climate change, and historical overhunting. However, its current habitat suitability patterns and the environmental drivers of its distribution remain poorly understood. In this study, we used 429 occurrence records and 28 environmental variables, refined to 11 key predictors, to model the potential distribution of suitable habitats for tufted deer in China using the optimized MaxEnt model. The model performed robustly, identifying six dominant environmental factors—temperature annual range, annual precipitation, mean temperature of the coldest quarter, slope, vegetation fractional cover, and human footprint index—that collectively contributed 91.6% to habitat suitability predictions. The deer exhibited a preference for habitats with moderate temperature variation (25.3-30.4 °C), bimodal precipitation patterns (725-1,324 mm and 1,651-1,898 mm), and cooler winter temperatures (−2.0-9.9 °C), typically found in mountainous regions. Suitability analysis revealed that moderately and highly suitable habitats are concentrated in eight provinces, with Sichuan, Guizhou, and Yunnan contributing the largest areas. Despite these extensive suitable habitats, our GAP analysis showed that 93.98% of them lie outside current protected areas, indicating substantial conservation gaps. Even in core provinces such as Sichuan and Guizhou, only a small fraction (≤10.84%) of the highly suitable habitats are protected. These findings highlight the urgent need to re-evaluate and expand protected area networks to include high-quality tufted deer habitats. Our study provides essential ecological insights and spatial data to guide habitat conservation, functional zoning, and long-term management strategies for tufted deer populations in China.