It is native to streamside pine-oak forests and canyons in the Sierra Madre Occidental of Mexico from northern Sonora and Chihuahua south to western Michoacán.

The eared quetzal was described and illustrated in 1838 by the English ornithologist and bird artist John Gould in his book A Monograph of the Trogonidae, or Family of Trogons based on a specimen collected in Mexico.

[6] A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2005 found that the eared quetzal was sister to a clade containing members of the genus Pharomachrus.

The adult male has a blackish head, iridescent green breast, and geranium red belly and undertail coverts.

Both sexes bear the wispy hair-like auricular plumes that give the species its name, though these are rarely apparent in the field.

Quetzals differ from typical New World trogons in having iridescent wing coverts, less extensive fusion between the two forward-facing toes of their heterodactyl foot, broad tails with distinctly convex (rather than straight or concave) sides, and eggs with pale blue shells.