The western banded snake eagle (Circaetus cinerascens) is a grey-brown African raptor with a short tail and a large head.

Juveniles have paler and browner upper parts than adults, with white-edged feathers.

Western banded snake eagles live in woodlands, mainly along rivers, but they avoid dense forests.

The western banded snake eagle sometimes rises to soar, while it calls above the canon.

They are found in Africa in the northern tropics from Senegal and Gambia east through to Ethiopia and then south to southern Angola and Zimbabwe, mostly west of the Rift Valley, but are mostly absent from the western lowland equatorial forests.