<p>Investigation of the mechanism of temperature influence on methane occurrence traits is of major significance for the exploitation of deep coalbed methane. To explore the features of methane occurrence in coal seams at various temperatures, low-pressure nitrogen and low-pressure carbon dioxide adsorption experiments were employed to quantitatively analyze the pore structure for low-, medium- and high-order coal samples. According to micropore filling theory and monolayer adsorption theory, the distribution traits of methane in various pore sizes were determined and combined with the isothermal adsorption experiment results, and a new approach for computing the adsorption phase density is proposed. The influence of temperature on methane occurrence and its specific influence on methane occurrence in various pore sizes were analyzed by the variation of molecular kinetic energy. The theoretical results of methane limit adsorption were validated to be reliable by the experimental results. The results demonstrated the following. (1) Temperature alters the adsorption capacity mainly by affecting the kinetic energy of the molecules. At 20–60&#xa0;°C, the average limiting adsorption capacity for the three coal samples declined by 6.12%. (2) At 20–60&#xa0;°C, as the temperature rose, the Langmuir volume was consistent with the ultimate adsorption capacity calculated based on the molecular kinetic energy, in pore structures with diameters larger than 0.76 nm, while the relative error was between − 0.25% and 0.88%. This indicates that, while temperature rises, the limiting adsorption capacity of methane declines gradually in pores with diameters greater than 0.76 nm. (3) At 20–60&#xa0;°C, methane was mainly filled in micropores with diameters of 0.38–1.5 nm. As the temperature increased, the proportion of methane in the microporous form increased slightly, ranging 0.01–0.96%.</p>