7 Hummingbirds Spotted in Illinois: From Backyard Regulars to Rare Vagrants
October 16, 2026
Most Illinois backyard birders assume they’re watching “the” hummingbird every time a tiny bird zips past the feeder, but the state’s official record books tell a more surprising story. Only one hummingbird species actually breeds in Illinois, yet the state’s bird records committee has documented seven different species over the decades, including birds whose home ranges sit thousands of miles to the west. Hummingbirds in Illinois range from a common backyard regular to genuine rarities that draw birders from across the Midwest the moment one turns up at a feeder.
This guide walks through all seven species on the state’s official list, what makes each one identifiable, and when (or if) an Illinois resident might realistically expect to see one.
1. Ruby-Throated Hummingbird
The ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) is the only species that actually nests in Illinois, and it accounts for nearly every hummingbird sighting in the state. Ruby-throated hummingbirds are the only type of hummingbirds native to Northern Illinois. The initial wave each spring is the only breed indigenous to the U.S. east of the Mississippi River.
Breeding runs the length of the warm season. Ruby-throated hummingbirds breed statewide from late April through September, and account for nearly every sighting. Because Chicago-area birders sit near the northern edge of the state, timing shifts noticeably by latitude: the first ruby-throateds reach Cairo and the river bottoms of southern Illinois in early April, while Chicagoland typically doesn’t see peak numbers until the second half of May, a six-to-eight-week spread across one state.
Fall departure follows a similarly broad window. Southbound movement starts in August, and most breeding ruby-throateds are gone from the state by late October. Unlike some Gulf Coast states covered in a Louisiana hummingbird guide, Illinois doesn’t have a documented overwintering ruby-throated population the way some more southern states do. Males show the trademark iridescent ruby throat patch and emerald-green back; females lack the colored gorget and show a white throat instead.
Pro Tip: Leave feeders up through September and into early October. Late-season nectar helps migrating ruby-throateds refuel before their long flight toward Central America, and it also happens to be the exact window when rare western vagrants are most likely to turn up.
2. Rufous Hummingbird
The rufous hummingbird (Selasphorus rufus) holds a status in Illinois that surprises most backyard birders: it’s the only other species, besides the breeding ruby-throated, that the state’s records committee considers expected every year. IORC codes rufous “Regular” — the committee’s own top tier, meaning at least eight records in the previous ten years and expected within the state annually. It’s the only hummingbird besides breeding ruby-throated to carry that designation, a direct statement that this is a genuine, repeatable statewide pattern rather than a run of coincidental sightings.
Its presence here isn’t new. The rufous hummingbird was first documented in Illinois in 1993, with one record in Olympia Fields and another in Murphysboro. Since then, it’s been regularly seen nearly every year in fall in different parts of the state. Timing runs opposite the ruby-throated’s calendar: rufous hummingbird is Illinois’s most regular winter visitor, typically peaking in early December. That overlaps with the kind of late-season vagrancy also documented in a hummingbirds in Ohio roundup, where western stragglers show up on a similar fall-into-winter schedule.
Identification separates clean by sex. Males have orange-red throats, while females have white, speckled throats and rufous reddish-brown coloring on their white-tipped tail feathers. The species’ actual breeding ground is nowhere near Illinois — rufous hummingbird’s breeding range is the Pacific Northwest and western Canada — and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources lists it as a “regular visitor,” not a breeder. Birders comparing notes with a hummingbirds in Colorado guide will recognize the species immediately, since Colorado sits much closer to its core range.
3. Anna’s Hummingbird
Anna’s hummingbird (Calypte anna) is one of several species on this list that starts with the letter A, alongside Allen’s hummingbird further down — a detail that trips up anyone working from a bird identification guide organized alphabetically rather than by rarity. This species graces the western regions of North America and is a rare visitor to Illinois. Males show an iridescent rose-pink crown and throat against an emerald back; females are duller green with only a small throat patch.
What makes Anna’s unusual among Illinois vagrants is that it doesn’t follow a true migratory pattern in its home range. Anna’s hummingbird is non-migratory, and because of this, seeing one in Illinois is uncommon, to say the least. Even so, it’s not a one-time fluke: rufous hummingbird turns up most winters, and Anna’s shows up some winters too, in smaller numbers. Several other even rarer hummingbird species for the state have been documented in Illinois, including Allen’s, broad-billed, and Anna’s. Anyone keeping a personal ornithology reference for the state should flag Anna’s as a late-fall-through-winter feeder watch, the same window covered in guides to hummingbirds in Arizona, where the species is a true year-round resident rather than a wanderer.
4. Black-Chinned Hummingbird
The black-chinned hummingbird (Archilochus alexandri) is the western counterpart to Illinois’s own ruby-throated — the two species share a genus and divide North America between them almost cleanly. As its name suggests, the species has a characteristic blackish-purple patch of feathers along its neck, and it remains an uncommon visitor to the state of Illinois.
Records here are sparse but not static. There have been a handful of sightings in this state throughout the years, and it seems these small birds have been widening their natural range. A Daily Herald report on spring migration noted that occasionally a vagrant species like a rufous or black-chinned hummingbird will show up and thrill birders in the Chicago suburbs. Sightings tend to cluster at backyard feeders in late summer, and the black-chinned hummingbird, native to the southwestern United States, has been documented only a handful of times in Illinois, mostly at backyard feeders during late summer months.
The wandering tendency isn’t unique to Illinois. A detailed species guide notes that the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine’s hummingbird program lists documented records from more than twenty states and provinces outside the western breeding range, reaching as far east as Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia, and as far north as Saskatchewan. Readers comparing records with a hummingbirds in Tennessee guide will find the species shows up there too, confirming the eastward dispersal pattern. Population-wide, Breeding Bird Survey data show an increase of about 0.3% per year between 1966 and 2019 for the species overall, even though Illinois sightings remain scarce.
5. Allen’s Hummingbird
Allen’s hummingbird (Selasphorus sasin) rounds out the second bird on this list beginning with the letter A, and it’s arguably the hardest Illinois vagrant to confirm without a photograph. Allen’s hummingbird is a rare and accidental species in Illinois, with far fewer records than its close relative the rufous.
The identification challenge is real even for experienced birders. The two species overlap so closely in plumage that the appearance of Allen’s hummingbird is highly similar to a rufous hummingbird, and the reliable difference comes down to the back color — rufous males show an orange-rufous back, while Allen’s males keep a green back despite matching orange-rufous tones elsewhere. Anyone cross-referencing a types of birds beginning with A list for the Midwest will find Allen’s listed as accidental rather than regular, a distinction that matters when reporting a sighting to the Illinois Ornithological Records Committee. Its native range sits in a narrow coastal strip between California and Oregon, making any Illinois appearance a genuine long-distance wander, comparable to the vagrancy patterns documented in a hummingbirds in North Carolina guide covering similar East Coast strays.
6. Broad-Billed Hummingbird
The broad-billed hummingbird (Cynanthus latirostris) is native to Mexico and the extreme southwestern United States, which makes any Illinois record notable enough to document individually. Broad-billed hummingbirds are an accidental species in Illinois, with rare sightings recorded in Chicago, Peoria, and Springfield.
One of the state’s accepted records is well documented: the Illinois Audubon Society’s records committee update logged a broad-billed hummingbird on 8 May 2020 in Lerna, Coles County, with documentation credited to observer Eric Bollinger. A separate species guide puts the statewide total at at least four accepted Illinois records scattered across different decades. Males show an iridescent blue-green throat and a distinctly broad, red-based bill that gives the species its name; females are duller with a pale throat. Readers researching nearby states will find a similar rarity pattern in a hummingbirds in Oklahoma guide, where the species also appears as an occasional stray rather than a resident.
| Species | Illinois Status | Typical Season |
|---|---|---|
| Ruby-throated Hummingbird | Common, native breeder | Late April – October |
| Rufous Hummingbird | Regular visitor (non-breeder) | October – December, peaking early December |
| Anna’s Hummingbird | Rare, occasional winter visitor | Winter months, some years only |
| Black-chinned Hummingbird | Rare vagrant | Late summer, scattered records |
| Allen’s Hummingbird | Accidental | No set pattern, very few records |
| Broad-billed Hummingbird | Casual/accidental | Spring, scattered records |
| Mexican Violetear | Casual, documented rarity | No set pattern |
7. Mexican Violetear
The Mexican violetear (Colibri thalassinus) is the least expected name on Illinois’s official hummingbird list, and its home range gives a sense of just how far it strayed to get here. The species normally lives in the mountain forests of Mexico and Central America, where its green body and glowing violet-blue patches on the cheek and chest make it a striking, unmistakable bird among its usual neighbors.
In Illinois, it’s grouped with the state’s genuine long-distance rarities rather than its regular visitors. Rufous is a regular winter visitor, and five documented rarities round out the list, including Mexican violetear. Five more species round out the state’s list, each a genuine, documented rarity reviewed individually by the records committee before being added to Illinois’s official checklist. Compared with the hummingbirds in Michigan list just across Lake Michigan, Illinois’s inclusion of a Central American species on its state records is a reminder that hummingbird vagrancy can run in almost any direction, not just east-to-west.
Anyone hoping to add one of these seven species to a personal checklist should start with the basics: keep feeders clean and full from April through at least mid-October, and don’t rush to take them down once the ruby-throateds head south. The rarest sightings in Illinois overwhelmingly happen at backyard feeders that stayed up a few extra weeks. For a broader look at how Illinois hummingbirds compare with orange birds in Illinois or other backyard visitors, the state’s birding community keeps detailed, year-by-year records that make it easy to know exactly what’s been seen, where, and how often.