They hunt alone, in pairs, or when hunting larger prey in small groups. Omnivorous feeders, they prey on a variety of small animals, sometimes cooperating to attack larger mammals; they also eat plant matter, carrion, and garbage. They can maintain a speed of 35 mi (56 km) per hour while chasing prey. Coyotes are responsible for destroying some domestic livestock, but they are valuable scavengers and destroyers of rodents.

There has almost always been a bounty on coyotes somewhere in the United States, and many thousands are killed each year. Despite this, coyotes have not been reduced in number, and their range has actually increased in the past century, due in part to the fact that many formerly forested areas now more closely resemble the plains and also that the eradication of top-level predators, such as wolves and mountain lions, has left an open ecological niche. Common in the central and W United States, they range N to Alaska, S to Central America, and E to New England and Nova Scotia; they have even begun to move into urban centers, such as New York City. The coyotes of the E United States are larger than those in the West as a result of having interbred with wolves.

The coyote is classified in the phylum Chordata, subphylum Vertebrata, class Mammalia, order Carnivora, family Canidae.