A long-tailed bird seen mainly in eastern Honshu woods and residential areas in Japan. It lives in flocks throughout the year.
Its head looks capped in black, while the wings and long tail are blue-grey. The tail feathers have white tips.
Azure-winged Magpies may have helpers that visit nests to assist with breeding. A study in snowy central Japan in 1983 watched 14 nests. Six had one or two helpers, and one had none; helper attendance at the other seven could not be confirmed. The observed groups included one summer-visiting group of 16 birds and two resident groups of about 20 birds each.
Depending on how the seven uncertain nests are counted, helpers were present at 43–93% of nests. Seven of 14 marked birds (50%) acted as helpers. The authors concluded that cooperative breeding occurred regularly in this population. The study covered one population and one breeding season, and helper attendance could not be confirmed at half of the nests.
IUCN Red List · Least Concern (LC) · Global
Globally, the current IUCN Red List record lists the Azure-winged Magpie as Least Concern (LC). The record gives 2025 as the latest assessment year.
In Japan, the Ministry of the Environment's Fifth Red Data Book lists the subspecies Cyanopica cyanus japonica as Near Threatened (NT). It cites a 32% decrease in Tokyo's breeding distribution survey, decreases of 49% in recorded routes and 71% in individuals in the national survey, and an estimated 14.1% annual decrease in Satoyama monitoring from 2008 to 2022. This is a Japan-only subspecies assessment, separate from the global IUCN species assessment.