Abstract: To provide a reference for biodiversity protection in Chongqing, sample-plot method was applied to investigate the species composition, individuals, species diversity, dominant index and community similarity of ant communities in 33 sample plots from 6 vertical and 9 horizontal bands along two main rivers in Daba Mountains Nature Reserve. The result showed that there were 59 ant species in total, which belonged to 32 genera and 5 subfamilies of Formicidae, among which 24 species were new record species in Chongqing. Analysis showed that ant individuals changed between 38 and 6 815, species richness ranged from 3 to 19, species diversity Shannon Wiener changed from 0.184 1 to 2.127 5, dominance index ranged from 0.144 to 0.928, and evenness index ranged between 0.167 6 and 0.850 3 among different plots. The highest richness of ant species was in low mountainous broadleaf forests at the 1000 m altitude of lower Qian River (19 species). The highest diversity of ant communities was in low mountainous broadleaf forest at the 1 000 m altitude of middle Qian River (2.127 5), while its dominance index was the lowest (0.144 0). The highest evenness index of ant community was in sub-mountainous conifer forest at 2 000 m altitude of upper Qian River (0.850 3). The richness of ant species was higher in Qian River than in Ren River. It was showed that differences between species composition of ant community at different altitude and vegetation was significant. Generally speaking, community numbers increased by altitude, while species richness, species diversity, dominant index and community similarity presented an odd peak curve which increased first and then decreased by altitude in Daba Mountain Nature Reserve. The latter was affected by secondary and fragmented vegetation caused by sustained human disturbance at low altitude. Thus, the species diversity of ant community is affected significantly by altitude, vegetation and human disturbance.