In 1862 Theodore N. Gill used Poey’s Mesoprion vorax, a junior synonym of C. macrophthalmus, as the type species of the genus Platyinius, which is now regarded as a subgenus of Pristipomoides.

[4] Pristipomoides macrophthalmus has a moderately deep oblong body,[5] its depth being typically over a third of its standard length, which is fusiform.

[2] Pristipomoides macrophthalmus occurs in the western Atlantic Ocean where it is found from Bermuda and southeastern Florida and Louisiana south through the Gulf of Mexico to Campeche and Cuba.

It is also found in the Caribbean Sea from Cuba to St Lucia and along the coast of Centra and South America from Nicaragua to La Guajira, Colombia.

In Puerto Rico it became a target species when stocks of Lutjanus vivanus underwent a significant decrease.