It is found in Belize, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Panama.

Both sexes of adults have rufous-chestnut upperparts with a cinnamon-buff rump and black bars on the back and uppertail coverts.

The adult's bill is ivory-yellow with a blue-green tinge at its base, their iris chestnut or garnet brown, and their legs dark olive to grayish.

Juveniles are similar to adults but duller and darker overall, with dusky mottling on the malar area, and fewer and more irregular black marks on their underparts.

[3] The chestnut-colored woodpecker is found on the Caribbean side of Middle America from southern Veracruz in Mexico south through Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica to just into Panama's Bocas del Toro Province.

It primarily inhabits the interior and edges of humid evergreen and semi-deciduous forests but is also found in mangroves and coastal scrub in some areas.

[3] The chestnut-colored woodpecker mostly feeds on ants and termites but also eats smaller amounts of other insects and fruit.