The tree has a tendency to color and drop its leaves slightly earlier in autumn than other maples.

The trunks tend to produce cavities, which can shelter squirrels, raccoons, opossums, owls and woodpeckers, and are frequented by carpenter ants.

[7] Additionally, the leaves serve as a source of food for species of Lepidoptera, such as the rosy maple moth (Dryocampa rubicunda).

[9] Lumber from the tree is used in furniture, cabinets, flooring, musical instruments, crates, and tool handles, because it is light and easily worked.

[10] Silver maple is often planted as an ornamental tree because of its rapid growth and ease of propagation and transplanting.

The silver maple's root system is shallow and fibrous and easily invades septic fields and old drain pipes; it can also crack sidewalks and foundations.

[citation needed] Following World War II, silver maples were commonly used as a landscaping and street tree in suburban housing developments and cities due to their rapid growth, especially as a replacement for the blighted American elm.

However, they fell out of favor for this purpose because of brittle wood, unattractive form when not pruned or trained, and tendency to produce large numbers of volunteer seedlings.

It is generally absent from the humid US coastal plain south of Maryland, so it is confined to the Appalachians in those states.

[13] It can thrive in a Mediterranean climate, as at Jerusalem and Los Angeles, if summer water is provided.

The cultivar Acer × freemanii Autumn Blaze = 'Jeffersred'[14] has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.

[15] Native Americans used the sap of wild trees to make sugar, as medicine, and in bread.

[16] The Cherokee take an infusion of the bark to treat cramps, menstrual pains, dysentery, and hives.