It occurs widely in the northern Indian subcontinent, eastwards to southern China, the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra, western and central Java and northeast Borneo.

The straight-pointed bill is longer than the head, and the legs have four-toed zygodactyl feet (two toes pointing forward, two backward) and are lead-grey in color.

The long tongue can be darted forward to extract wood-boring arthropod prey; while mainly feeding on small invertebrates, greater flamebacks also drink nectar.

[5] Widely distributed and common in parts of its range, the greater flameback is classified as least concern on the IUCN Red List.

In all of these cases, these birds are neither gregarious nor known to be bad-tasting, and due to their size difference and habitat preferences, do not compete much; hence the usual reasons for mimicry do not seem to apply.