Background Glossina austeni and Glossina brevipalpis (Diptera: Glossinidae) are the sole cyclical vectors of African trypanosomes in South Africa, Eswatini and southern Mozambique. These populations represent the southernmost distribution of tsetse flies on the African continent. Accurate knowledge of infested areas is a prerequisite to develop and implement efficient and cost-effective control strategies, and distribution models may reduce large-scale, extensive entomological surveys that are time consuming and expensive. The objective was to develop a MaxEnt species distribution model and habitat suitability maps for the southern tsetse belt of South Africa, Eswatini and southern Mozambique.