The genus name Ara is derived from the Tupi word ará, an onomatopoeia of the sound a macaw makes.

The genus Ara was erected by the French naturalist Bernard Germain de Lacépède in 1799.

[3] The type species was designated as the scarlet macaw (Ara macao) by Robert Ridgway in 1916.

Orthopsittaca and Diopsittaca are monotypic and are morphologically and behaviourally different, whereas the three Primolius macaws are green and smaller.

They may have been distinct species, or familiar parrots that were imported onto an island and later presumed to have a separate identity.

They have a massive downward curved upper mandible and a patch of pale skin around the eye that extends to base of the beak.

The most widespread species, the scarlet macaw, is (or was) distributed throughout large parts of Central America and the Amazon.

The overall range of many species and the genus as a whole has declined in historical times due to human activities.

The blue-and-yellow macaw was extirpated from Trinidad in the 1960s[9] (but was later reintroduced),[10] and several hypothetical species apparently became extinct in the islands of the Caribbean.

The birds were traded between islands, and were among the gifts offered to Christopher Columbus when he reached the Bahamas in 1492.

[16][18] No endemic Caribbean macaws remain today, and they were likely all driven to extinction by humans, some in historic, and others in prehistoric times.

[19] In addition to the three species known from remains, several hypothetical extinct Ara macaws were only based on contemporary accounts, but are considered dubious today.

[16] The identity and distribution of indigenous macaws in the Caribbean is only likely to be further resolved through palaeontological discoveries and examination of contemporary reports and artwork.