[2] Its original habitats were subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, rocky areas, and caves, now severely reduced to the "Black Mountains" 25 km (16 mi) south-west of Cooktown, Queensland.

[2] The Queensland Environmental Protection Agency has described and summarized some of the distinctive features of this frog as follows:[2] The vulnerable Black Mountain boulderfrog or rock haunting frog (Cophixalus saxatilis) is one of the largest (about the size of a walnut) of Australia's microhylids — a group of frogs normally confined to the leaf litter of tropical rainforests.

An adult tends to the eggs and young, which hatch as fully formed froglets.

They have acquired an almost crab-like ability to scuttle on the granite boulders, although they can still disappear in a series of leaps when alarmed.

At night these frogs emerge to forage on the boulders of the mountain and in and about the scattered figs and fringing monsoon forest.