Like other buttonquails, the female is larger and more boldly coloured than the male, with a distinctive black head and neck sprinkled with fine white markings.

The usual sex roles are reversed, as the female mates with multiple male partners and leaves them to incubate the eggs.

The black-breasted buttonquail is usually found in rainforests, foraging on the ground for invertebrates in large areas of thick leaf litter.

The black-breasted buttonquail was originally described by ornithologist John Gould in 1837 as Hemipodius melanogaster,[3] from specimens collected around Moreton Bay in Queensland.

[4] In 1840 English zoologist George Robert Gray established that the genus name Turnix, coined in 1790 by French naturalist Pierre Joseph Bonnaterre, had priority over Hemipodius, which had been published in 1815 by Coenraad Jacob Temminck.

[2] He also described a subspecies Colcloughia melanogaster goweri from Gowrie on the basis of less extensive black plumage,[8] though this was later regarded as individual variation.

The male has a whitish face and neck with black speckles and darker ear coverts, and a brown-grey crown and nape.

[9] The juvenile resembles the adult male though has a blue-grey iris, duller brown-grey upperparts more heavily blotched with black on outer back and scapulars and less pale streaks.

[9] The female makes a low-pitched oom call[15] – a sequence of 5–7 notes that last 1.5–2.0 seconds each – which can be repeated 14–21 (or less commonly 1–4) times.

[18] Fieldwork across the Wide Bay–Burnett region from 2016 to 2018 found it in scattered locations in its suitable habitat from Teewah Beach to Inskip Point on the mainland and along the east coast of near K'Gari.

[19] It is found in Palmgrove National Park, which has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area for the species.

Mike West, former president of Birds Queensland, blamed dingoes and wild dogs for wiping out the population.

[9] The usual sex roles are reversed in the buttonquail genus (Turnix), as the larger and more brightly-coloured female mates with multiple male partners and leaves them to incubate the eggs.

[25] The nest is a shallow depression measuring 10 by 6 cm (4 by 2.5 in) scraped out of the leaf litter and ground, lined with leaves, moss and dried vegetation.

[27] A covey of birds scrapes out up to a hundred plate-shaped shallow feeding sites, though ten to forty is more usual.

[16] A 2018 analysis of faecal pellets revealed beetles, ants and earwigs to be prominent, though the authors concluded the black-breasted buttonquail is a generalist insectivore.

[14] As of 2021[update], the Butchulla Land and Sea Rangers are collaborating with researchers on a three-year project aimed at reducing threats to the bird and improving its habitat to ensure survival into the future.