[2] In July 2015, it was one of three forests included in a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Par force hunting landscape in North Zealand.

[7] Gribskov and Lake Esrum are designated as EU habitat directive and Natura 2000 areas, as part of an even larger preserve.

Around 20% or c. 1,200 ha of the forest has been reserved as 'forest to be untouched', in an effort to preserve some of the few spots of semi-natural woodland (SNW) in Denmark and stimulate the growth of new.

Cormorants can be a problematic bird to administer locally, but they are protected in Denmark and on list III in the Berne convention.

[10] The forest grows in a hilly terrain (by Danish standards), with lower lying areas in the east and west.

The low-lying areas are dominated by beech and oak, but with several forest types mixed in, such as wood pastures or old coppice woodland with alder and ash.

[9] Gribskov is more than 10,000 years old, dating from the end of the last ice age,[11] but the forest bears the marks of an intensive plantation industry that accelerated from the late 1700s and peaked in the 1800s.

[12] These measures have already enhanced the biological diversity and has had a direct positive influence on the living conditions for birds in the forest.

There are many small ponds, streams and lakes throughout Gribskov, but the larger ones—Store Gribsø, Solbjerg Engsø and Strødam Engsø—all are situated in the southwestern parts.

It is a 2–3 km long artificial canal, winding its way through the forest from the lake of Store Gribsø and south towards the settlement of Gadevang in the southeastern section.

It was raised at some point in the neolithic Stone Age, about 5–6,000 years ago and is referred to as Jættestuen, simply meaning The Passage Grave in English.

In 1736, the German forester Johann Georg von Langen participated in restoring the Danish woodlands of the time by introducing European larch.

: The Tinghus-larches), one of the trees, now marked with a yellow ring and standing 36 m tall, was picked in 1935 by the Danish forestry geneticist Carl Syrach-Larsen for hybrid experimentation.

The most visible signs are perhaps the extensive path structures laid out in different parts of the forests, especially near Nødebo, in the years 1680–90 by King Christian V. These are long straight lines, usually designed in star-patterns, merging and radiating from strategical points.