• Phylogenetic placement: Passeri: Passerides: Muscicapida: Muscicapoidea
• Distribution: Africa, Eurasia, Philippines, Wallacea, northern Australia
• Number of extant and recently extinct genera: 36
• Number of extant and recently extinct species: 123

Traditional genus-level classification of extant and recently extinct (red letters) Sturnidae following the AviList checklist v2025. (link) The number of subspecies is given in parentheses. 

References

Barker FK, Cibois A, Schikler P, Feinstein J, and Cracraft J (2004), Phylogeny and diversification of the largest avian radiation, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 101, 11040-45. (pdf)

Baveja P, Garg KM, Chattopadhyay B, Sadanandan KR, Prawiradilaga DM, Yuda P, Lee JGH, and Rheindt FE (2020), Using historical genome-wide DNA to unravel the confused taxonomy in a songbird lineage that is extinct in the wild, Evol. Appl. 14, 698-709. (pdf)

Cibois A, and Cracraft J (2004), Assessing the passerine "Tapestry": phylogenetic relationships of the Muscicapoidea inferred from nuclear DNA sequences, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 32, 264-273. (abstract)

Fuchs J, Ericson PGP, and Irestedt M (2024), Genomic insights into the evolutionary and demographic histories of the extinct Hoopoe Starling (Fregilupus varius), Ibis 166, 1073-80. (pdf)

Gyllenhaal EF, Sweet PR, Kamminga P, and Andersen MJ (2026), Phylogeny of Pacific starlings (genus Aplonis) reveals cryptic diversity and diverse biogeographic patterns, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 222, e:108645. (abstract) (free pdf, ssrn preprint)

Han S, Ding H, Peng H, Dai C, Zhang S, Yang J, Gao J, and Kan X (2024), Sturnidae sensu lato mitogenomics: novel insights into codon aversion, selection, and phylogeny, Animals 14, e:2777. (free pdf)

Jiang C, Zhu W, Wu S, Zhao X, Mohamed N, and Li B (2025), Comparative mitogenomics, phylogeny, and biogeography of selected species of Saxicola (Aves, Passeriformes), ZooKeys 1249, 69-92. (free pdf)

Lovette IJ, and Rubenstein DR (2007), A comprehensive molecular phylogeny of the starlings (Aves: Sturnidae) and mockingbirds (Aves: Mimidae): congruent mtDNA and nuclear trees for a cosmopolitan avian radiation, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 44, 1031-56. (journal abstract) (author pdf)

Lovette IJ, McCleery BV, Talaba AL, and Rubenstein DR (2008), A complete species-level molecular phylogeny for the “Eurasian” starlings (Sturnidae: Sturnus, Acridotheres, and allies): Recent diversification in a highly social and dispersive avian group, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 47, 251-260. (abstract)

Stiller J, Feng S, Chowdhury AA, Rivas-González I, Duchêne DA, Fang Q, Deng Y, Kozlov A, Stamatakis A, Claramunt S, Nguyen JMT, Ho SYW, Faircloth BC, Haag J, Houde P, Cracraft J, Balaban M, Mai U, Chen G, Gao R, Zhou C, Xie Y, Huang Z, Cao Z, Yan Z, Ogilvie HA, Nakhleh L, Lindow B, Morel B, Fjeldså J, Hosner PA, da Fonseca RR, Petersen B, Tobias JA, Székely T, Kennedy JD, Reeve AH, Liker A, Stervander M, Antunes A, Tietze DT, Bertelsen M, Lei F, Rahbek C, Graves GR, Schierup MH, Warnow T, Braun EL, Gilbert MTP, Jarvis ED, Mirarab S, and Zhang G (2024), Complexity of avian evolution revealed by family-level genomes, Nature 629, 851-860. (pdf)

Zuccon D, Cibois A, Pasquet E, and Ericson PGP (2006), Nuclear and mitochondrial sequence data reveal the major lineages of starlings, mynas and related taxa, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 41, 333-344. (abstract)

Zuccon D, Pasquet E, and Ericson PGP (2008), Phylogenetic relationships among Palearctic-Oriental starlings and mynas (genera Sturnus and Acridotheres: Sturnidae), Zool. Scr. 37, 469-481. (abstract)