It occurs in a wide variety of habitats including tundra, forest tundra, forest, forest steppe, steppe, forest edges and glades, semi-desert, swamps, peatlands, moorlands, meadows, fields, bush lands, gardens. It has a breeding season, and spawning and larval development takes place in various stagnant water bodies of low acidity, including lakes, ponds, swamps, puddles and ditches. There is some evidence that the species can occur in agricultural landscapes, and in some areas it appears to be adapting to urban conditions, e.g. Vershinin (1997).

Within Europe, Rana arvalis is spread through most of the northern, central and eastern parts of Europe (Gasc et al. 1997, Arnold 2003). The southern edge of the species area includes Slovenia (Poboljšaj et al. 2008, Stanković and Cipot 2014, Cipot et al. 2015, Stanković et al. 2015), northern Croatia, southernmost Hungary, central Romania (Cogalniceanu et al. 2015), European Russia (Garanin 2000) and southernmost Ukraine (Taraszczuk 1984). It is no longer believed to be present in Serbia and the original records were probably in error (Kalezic and Dzukic 2001). Switzerland is also excluded here following Schmidt et al. (2023), who consider it an introduced species with no evidence of reproduction. It is typically a lowland species in Europe, up to 800 m asl (Speybroeck et al. 2016).

Out of the European region, the range of the species spreads eastwards to Yakutia and Baikal Lake in Russian Siberia (Bannikov et al. 1977), Kazakhstan, and China (Xinjiang Province).

Conservation in Place
It is listed on Appendix II of the Bern Convention and on Annex IV of the EU Natural Habitats Directive. It is protected by national legislation in many countries and has been recorded in a number of national and sub-national Red Data books and lists.

It is considered Endangered in France (UICN France et al. 2015), Czechia (Chobot and Něměc 2017), Romania (Botnariuc and Tatole 2005), Vulnerable in Austria (Gollmann 2007), Slovenia (Anonymous 2010), and Near Threatened in Hungary (Halpern et al. 2017).

It is presumed to be present in a many protected areas. In parts of the species' range, mitigation measures to reduce roadkill have been established.There were ten EC-funded LIFE-projects targeting the species or its habitats:https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/life/publicWebsite/search/get?basicSearchText=rana+arvalis

Conservation Needed
Water management should target the restoration of water bodies, serving as breeding habitat for the species throughout its range, but especially within EU Natura 2000 network.

Research Needed
Monitoring of populations for the presence and effects of Bd infection or other emerging pathogens need to be organised throughout its range.