[5] A 2019 publication showed that Hylopezus was paraphyletic with respect to two other genera and that the speckle-breasted antpitta properly belonged to none of them.

Adults have pale buff lores, a whitish "moustache", and a ring of bare buffy white skin around their eye.

[7][8][9] The speckle-breasted antpitta is found in Brazil from southern Minas Gerais and western Rio de Janeiro state south to northern Rio Grande do Sul and west into extreme eastern Paraguay and northeastern Argentina's Misiones Province.

It inhabits the floor and undergrowth in the interior and edges of humid montane forest and mature secondary woodland.

It is primarily terrestrial, and forages with short hops and abrupt stops to study and probe leave litter and soil.

[7] Nothing is known about the speckle-breasted antpitta's breeding biology beyond that a bird was seen in September on a nest made of sticks.

The speckle-breasted antpitta's song is a "short, fairly fast beautiful, fluted series of about 10 notes increasing in volume and pitch".