Like others in the genus, they feed on the ground, often along streams and in damp places foraging for snails, crabs, fruits and insects.

The blue whistling thrush was formally described in 1786 by the Austrian naturalist Giovanni Antonio Scopoli under the binomial name Gracula caerulea.

[5] The blue whistling thrush is now one of nine species placed in the genus Myophonus that was introduced in 1822 by the Dutch zoologist Coenraad Jacob Temminck.

[6] Six subspecies are recognised:[6] This whistling thrush is dark violet blue with shiny spangling on the tips of the body feathers other than on the lores, abdomen and under the tail.

The population in Afghanistan, turkestanicus, is often included in the widespread temminckii which has a smaller bill width at the base and is found along the Himalayas east to northern Burma.

Cambodia and the Malay peninsula have crassirostris, while dichrorhynchus with smaller spangles occurs further south and in Sumatra.

The species ranges across Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tibet, Turkmenistan, Pakistan and Vietnam.

[9][18][19] Perez et al., 2023 find M. caeruleus has an unusually large diameter – 10.4 centimetres (4.1 in) – nest among passerines – the largest among all they surveyed.