Discovered on December 18, 1994, it is considered one of the most significant prehistoric art sites and the UN's cultural agency UNESCO granted it World Heritage status on June 22, 2014.

[5] In addition to the paintings and other human evidence, they also discovered fossilized remains, prints, and markings from a variety of animals, some of which are now extinct.

The dates have been a matter of dispute but a study published in 2012 supports placing the art in the Aurignacian period, approximately 32,000–30,000 years ago.

The later Gravettian occupation, which occurred 27,000 to 25,000 years ago, left little but a child's footprints, the charred remains of ancient hearths,[6] and carbon smoke stains from torches that lit the caves.

This combination of subjects has led some students of prehistoric art and cultures to believe that there was a ritual, shamanic, or magical aspect to these paintings.

Many of the paintings appear to have been made only after the walls were scraped clear of debris and concretions, leaving a smoother and noticeably lighter area upon which the artists worked.

The art is also exceptional for its time for including "scenes", e.g., animals interacting with each other; a pair of woolly rhinoceroses, for example, are seen butting horns in an apparent contest for territory or mating rights.

[21] By 2011, more than 80 radiocarbon dates had been taken, with samples from torch marks and from the paintings themselves, as well as from animal bones and charcoal found on the cave floor.

The researchers' findings are based on the analysis using geomorphological and 36Cl dating of the rock slide surfaces around what is believed to be the cave's only entrance.

[25] In an email to the Los Angeles Times two of the authors explained, A human group (band or tribe) visited the Chauvet cave during the first period around 36,000 years ago for cultural purposes.

[30] Under the name of "Datation Grottes Ornées" (or DGO) project, this research is intended to determine the context in which the rock art caves of the region were visited.

The DGO project proposes to discuss the apparent chronological and iconographic exceptionality of Chauvet cave "from the outside" by placing it within a regional ensemble.

Access is severely restricted owing to the experience with decorated caves such as Altamira and Lascaux found in the 19th and 20th century, where the admission of visitors on a large scale led to the growth of mold on the walls that damaged the art in places.

The art is reproduced full-size in a condensed replica of the underground environment, in a circular building above ground, a few kilometres from the actual cave.