A hungry elephant knocked over motorcycles while searching for food outside a coffee shop.

The jumbo emerged from the nearby jungle and casually strolled into the parking area of a cafe looking for snacks in Nakhon Ratchasima province, Thailand.

Footage shows the tusker sniffing around the vehicles and the exterior of the small store.

The beast, named Plai Duan Wanalee, then nudged a red motorbike with its trunk and kicked it away.

He continued his search, pushing helmets off other parked bikes and moving over to the other side of the property.

Scared tourists backed away as Plai Duan Wanalee advanced and put its trunk through a small window at the front of the cafe.

Terrified onlooker Suthida Morya said: 'The elephant looked annoyed that there was no food.'

The elephant failed to take any food from the store, and while it was busy, visitors climbed into their car and drove away.

No one was hurt, and the vehicles had scratches from being knocked over by Plai Duan Wanalee on April 5.

Thailand has up to 3,500 elephants in the wild. The population has been increasing in recent years, but it is still a fraction of the estimated 300,000 wild elephants that lived in the country at the beginning of the 20th century.

The main threats to wild elephants in Thailand are habitat loss and fragmentation, poaching, and conflict with humans.