A wide black band separates the upper breast from the buffy to pale rufous belly.

[4] The buff-bellied puffbird is found in eastern Paraguay, far northeastern Argentina's Misiones Province, and in southeastern Brazil from southern Bahia and Espírito Santo south to Santa Catarina.

It is resident in Argentina but possibly moves from other parts of its range into São Paulo state in the austral summer.

[4] The buff-bellied puffbird hunts by sallies from a high bare perch to capture insects and sometimes small vertebrates; it also eats some fruits.

It excavates a nest cavity in an arboreal termitarium, and all other known breeding phenology at least for the Paraguayan subspecies is limited to one research paper.