The Arfak astrapia was formally described in 1788 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae.

The male has a black head with a bluish-purple sheen, or iridescence, an elongated jet-black nape crests extending up along the sides of the up to the eyes on each side, a shiny, metallic greenish-yellow cape from the mantle up to the nape, very black, dense and elongated upper breast feathers, and an almost exaggeratedly long tail almost two times the length of its body.

The female is less appealing, being dark brown over most of its body and a blackish head, and sporting much shorter tail feathers.

Astrapia nigra is endemic to the Arfak Mountains in Vogelkop Peninsula, West Papua.

Protected by its geographical isolation and undisturbed forests home, the Arfak astrapia is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.