Salweenia bouffordiana is a recently discovered endangered endemic species in southwest China, which mainly distributes along the valley of Yalong River in Xinlong County, Sichuan Province. The effective conservation of S. bouffordiana lies on evaluation of habitat suitability. The MaxEnt model is employed to identify the primary impact factors of the habitat of S. bouffordiana and to predict and evaluate its potentially suitable habitats. The analysis is based on 24 environmental variables of the area and data of field investigation along the Yalong river valley in 55 distribution points. We found that: (1) the AUC (area under ROC curve) value is over 0.9, indicating that the predictive effect of this model is appropriate, and the model can be used to predict and assess the habitat suitability of S. bouffordiana. (2) Mean annual temperature, precipitation of wettest month, mean diurnal temperature range and distance to river are the most predominant environmental variables affecting the habitat suitability of S. bouffordiana. The most suitable combination of environmental variables is a mean annual temperature of 7.9 ℃, a precipitation of wettest month of 120-124 mm, a mean diurnal temperature range of 13.8 ℃ and a distance of 33 m to river. (3) The areas of potential suitable and sub-suitable habitats for S. bouffordiana are 4.83×10³ hm² and 2.37×10⁴ hm², respectively. However, only potential suitable habitats of 7.56×10² hm² and sub-suitable habitats of 3.28×10³ hm² are within the jurisdiction of the existing nature reserves. The potential habitats are limited and mainly distributed along the valley. There are existing human activities to hamper the development and propagation of the population of S. bouffordiana in the current survival areas. In addition, the biological status of S. bouffordiana has not yet been assessed and determined. We suggest that the assessment and determination of biological status for S. bouffordiana should be put on the agenda. Small nature protected areas or community protected areas should be introduced for in-site conservation.