The turtle, also known as a Rafetus swinhoei and believed to be more than 90 years old, died in the Suzhou Zoo in southern China, the BBC reported.
There are only three left in the world, according to the Suzhou Daily.
The Suzhou Zoo has a male Yangtze giant softshell turtle, and the other two live in northern Vietnam but their genders are not known, CNN reported. The ones in Vietnam live in the wild, according to The New Yorker.
The female in China died a day after local staff and international experts attempted to artificially inseminate the turtle, according to the Suzhou Daily.
The species became endangered because of hunting and the destruction of its habitat, the BBC reported.
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