It is native to Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, and to the province of Yunnan in southern China, but it has been widely cultivated in many other places and has become naturalized in several regions.

Fruits are rare due to low pollen viability caused by irregular meiosis.

[7] At the interval of several decades, the whole population of an area blooms at once,[14] and individual stems bear a large number of flowers.

[7] Vegetation propagates through clump division, by rhizome, stem and branch cutting, layering, and marcotting.

[15] Its rhizomes extend up to 80 cm before turning upward to create open, fast-spreading clumps.

[20] The pachymorph (sympodial or superposed in such a way as to imitate a simple axis) rhizome system of clumping bamboos expands horizontally by only a short distance each year.

[22] The Bambuseae are a group of perennial evergreens in subfamily Bambusoideae, characterized by having three stigmata and tree-like behavior.

Although mostly known only from cultivation, spontaneous (nondomesticated), escaped, and naturalized populations exist throughout the tropics and subtropics in and outside Asia.

[5][7] B. vulgaris is widely cultivated in East, Southeast, and South Asia, as well as tropical Africa including Madagascar.

[16] It is believed to have been introduced to Hawaii in the time of Captain James Cook (the late 18th century), and is the most popular ornamental plant there.

[16] B. vulgaris grows mostly on river banks, road sides, wastelands, and open ground, generally in the low altitudes.

[7] The two major threats to the species are small bamboo borers (Dinoderus minutus), which as adults bore stems in India, China, Philippines, Australia, and Japan, and bamboo weevils (Cyrtotrachelus longimanus), which destroy shoots during their larval stage in South China.

Working and machining properties of the stems are poor, as they are not straight, not easy to split, and not flexible, but they are thick-walled and initially strong.

[7] Because of high carbohydrate content, stems are susceptible to attacks from fungi and insects such as powderpost beetles.

[10] A decoction of the growing tips is mixed with Job's tears (Coix lacryma-jobi) to make a refreshing drink in Mauritius.

[7] The shoots are tender and whitish pink[clarification needed], and have a fair canning quality.

[7] Among all bamboos, only shoots of B. vulgaris contains taxiphyllin (a cyanogenic glycoside) that functions as an enzyme inhibitor in the human body when released,[34] but degrades readily in boiling water.

[37] Horses in Pará, Brazil, were diagnosed with clinical signs of somnolence and severe ataxia after ingesting B.