The Costa Rica bird checklist: 944 species

The checklist

The names, the order and the status flags are the AOCR's, from the June 2026 update; the tick box, the date and place columns and the layout are ours.

How the list marks each bird, in the AOCR's own codes. R: resident, breeds in Costa Rica and is here all year. RR: breeds here, then migrates south. R?: not migratory, breeding here not yet confirmed. M: migrant, spends part of the year here, no breeding record. M?: migrant status uncertain. A: accidental, recorded once or very few times, far from its normal range. END: endemic to Costa Rica and the region. SC: on the list without a voucher specimen or photo yet. A bird can carry two, R,M, when it has a resident population and a migrant one.

Ten birds to look for

The same ten we have put in front of birders since 2017, with the names as the official list writes them today. These are not the rarest birds in the country. They are the ones that make a first trip, and each one says where we actually go to find it.

Resplendent Quetzal

Pharomachrus mocinno, resident

The bird most of our birding clients open the conversation with. A trogon, the biggest one here, the male with a red breast and tail streamers that can be longer than the rest of the bird. We send people to San Gerardo de Dota in the Highlands, where the guides work the wild avocado trees the quetzals feed on and know this season's fruiting trees.

Keel-billed Toucan

Ramphastos sulfuratus, resident

The toucan on every poster, with the rainbow bill. The Caribbean Lowlands and Arenal are where we see them most, usually in the morning at the top of a bare tree. One of six toucans on the list; the Yellow-throated Toucan, bigger and darker, is often on the same branch.

Scarlet Macaw

Ara macao, resident

Loud, red, and flying in pairs. Carara National Park and the Tárcoles River on the Central Pacific are where we take people for them, and the Osa Peninsula further south has them too. You hear them before you see them.

Long-tailed Manakin

Chiroxiphia linearis, resident

A small black bird with a sky-blue back and two long tail feathers, known for the dance two males perform side by side for one female. The dry forest of Guanacaste and the Nicoya Peninsula is its home on our side of the country.

Red-headed Barbet

Eubucco bourcierii, resident

A stocky little bird of the wet foothills, the male with a red head that looks painted on. The Caribbean Foothills above Turrialba are where our clients most often get it, at a lodge feeder.

Lesson's Motmot

Momotus lessonii, resident

Older field guides call this the Blue-crowned Motmot. The official list split that bird years ago and ours is now Lesson's Motmot, so if your book is older than the name, it is the same bird. Common in the Central Valley, including gardens around San José, with the racket-shaped tail that swings like a pendulum.

Violet Sabrewing

Campylopterus hemileucurus, resident

The biggest hummingbird you will see here, a deep violet male that owns the feeder it chooses. Cloud forest and highland lodges, San Gerardo de Dota and Monteverde among them.

Three-wattled Bellbird

Procnias tricarunculatus, resident, a regional endemic

Three wattles hanging from the bill and a call like a hammer on an anvil that carries across a valley. You hear it long before you see it. A bird of the cloud forest, Monteverde above all, that moves to lower ground part of the year.

Snowcap

Microchera albocoronata, resident, a regional endemic

A tiny wine-coloured hummingbird with a white cap. The Caribbean Foothills are the place: forest pools below the lodge, where it comes to bathe late in the afternoon.

Ornate Hawk-Eagle

Spizaetus ornatus, resident

The crested eagle of the wet forest, and the one bird on this list you cannot plan for. The Osa Peninsula and the Caribbean Foothills give the best chances; a guide who knows the territories is the difference.

Names and status from the Lista Oficial de las Aves de Costa Rica 2025-2026, June 2026 update, by the AOCR's Comité Científico. "Regional endemic" is the list's END flag: endemic to Costa Rica and the region, not to Costa Rica alone.

The families

Fifty-two hummingbirds, 19 of them regional endemics, and the lodges we use put feeders out before sunrise, so you meet a dozen of them over your first coffee. Six toucans, from the Northern Emerald-Toucanet to the Keel-billed. Nine trogons, the quetzal among them. Six motmots. Eighteen parrots and macaws, the Scarlet and the Great Green among them. Fifty-one tanagers and 51 New World warblers, most of the warblers migrants from the north. Those are counts by family from the official list, not our guess.

And the national bird is none of these. It is the Clay-colored Thrush, plain brown, chosen because its song opens the rainy season.

Browse all 944 by type

We sort the list into 19 types a birder would recognise in the field. Each one has its own page with every species on the list, the regional endemics marked, and where we find them.

• Hummingbirds52 species, 19 found only in this corner of the world, and most of them easy to watch at a feeder.
• Toucans and barbets8 species, 2 found only in this corner of the world, and the bill to know each one by.
• Trogons and the quetzal9 species, 2 found only in this corner of the world, and the tail to look under for each one.
• Motmots, kingfishers, jacamars and puffbirds19 species, 6 motmots among them, and the one that swings its tail like a clock pendulum.
• Parrots and macaws18 species, only 2 of them macaws, and a river at dawn where one of them crosses.
• Tanagers, honeycreepers, euphonias and finches113 species, 24 found only in this corner of the world, from garden fruit trees to the cloud forest canopy.
• Cotingas, manakins and tityras30 species, 6 found only in this corner of the world, and a call heard from 800 metres away.
• Flycatchers81 species in one family, 6 found only in this corner of the world, and 52 of them here all year.
• Antbirds, ovenbirds and woodcreepers66 species, 8 found only in this corner of the world, and not one of them a migrant.
• Woodpeckers16 species, 3 found only in this corner of the world, and 12 of them here all year.
• Warblers, vireos, orioles and oropendolas92 species, 6 found only in this corner of the world, and 45 of them migrants that visit.
• Wrens, thrushes, jays and other songbirds71 species, 15 found only in this corner of the world, from the Clay-colored Thrush in the garden to the Wrenthrush on the ridge.
• Raptors and owls75 raptors and owls, and the three found only in this corner of the world are all owls.
• Herons, storks, ibises and marsh birds51 herons, storks, ibises and marsh birds, watched mostly from a boat, from the Tempisque to Tortuguero.
• Shorebirds48 shorebirds, 37 of them migrants, and the few places where we have written one down.
• Seabirds84 seabirds, and 31 of them, 37 percent, are accidental: recorded once or very few times.
• Ducks and grebes27 ducks, geese and grebes, 11 of them accidental, and none yet with a place in our notes.
• Guans, curassows, quail, tinamous and doves45 guans, curassows, quail, tinamous and doves, 5 found only in this corner of the world.
• Cuckoos, nightjars, potoos and swifts39 species, 3 found only in this corner of the world, and the potoo that looks like a broken stump.

When to come

All year, honestly. Resident birds, 655 of the 944, are here every month. The northern migrants pass through from August to December and again from January to May on their way back, so a trip in those windows adds the warblers and the raptors on the move: in autumn the Keköldi ridge on the south Caribbean coast is one of the most important raptor migration routes in the world.

December to April is the dry season on the Pacific side. The Caribbean keeps its own calendar and is at its best in September and October.

The quetzal is the question we get every week, and the honest answer is that it is there all year with a guide, and best in the nesting season. Tell us your dates and we will tell you what the San Gerardo guides are seeing that month.

Start early and stop by ten. The birds are busiest in the first three hours of light, and so is our driver, which is why he leaves when you say. If your dates touch a busy week like Easter or Christmas, you are right to be planning now.

Where the birds are

Costa Rica is small enough to drive across in a day and varied enough that the birds change every hour of that drive. We work it as five zones, and each zone has its own page with its parks and hotspots. Under each one here are the lodges we use there, 53 in all, every one with its own page: the birding on the property, the birds to look for, and the trips that stay there.

See the five zonesSee the packages

Questions birders ask us

Species names, counts and status on this page are from: Garrigues, Richard, P. Camacho-Varela, J. Corrales, R. Jiménez, P. O'Donnell, D. Rodríguez (2026). Lista Oficial de las Aves de Costa Rica 2024-2025 – Actualización Junio 2026. Comité de Especies Raras y Registros Ornitológicos de Costa Rica (Comité Científico), Asociación Ornitológica de Costa Rica. https://listaoficialavesdecostarica.wordpress.com/