We investigate the tripartite entanglement dynamics of three two-level atoms in a multi-mode vacuum field. By considering the influences of the interatomic distance and the initial condition on the lower bound of concurrence and the tripartite negativity, we show that an optimal interatomic distance can be found to minimize the collective damping. Interestingly, at the same optimal distance, the tripartite entanglement would be maximized in the open dynamics process. In the case of shorter interatomic distance, the tripartite entanglement can display the oscillatory behavior in the initial short-time limit and be trapped in a stationary value in the long-time limit. In addition, the tripartite entanglement for the general situation with different interatomic distances is also discussed.