This hummingbird occurs in scattered foothill populations on the eastern Andes. In northeastern Peru its range extends from foothills into Amazonian lowlands.
Males have green upperparts, dark underparts and an iridescent purple throat patch. In the eastern-Andes Peruvian subspecies, iridescent green appears below the purple patch. Females are also green, with a black throat edged below in purple; the blue forked tail is deeper in males.
It feeds mainly on nectar. Oiseaux.net classifies it as sedentary; the reviewed sources do not identify particular flowers or feeding sites.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.