Ceyx melanurus and C. mindanensis (del Hoyo and Collar 2014) were previously lumped as C. melanurus following Sibley and Monroe (1990, 1993).

This species has a fairly large range, and hence does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the range size criterion (extent of occurrence <20,000 km² combined with a declining or fluctuating range size, habitat extent/quality, or population size and a small number of locations or severe fragmentation). The population trend is thought to be declining, but probably only slowly and hence the species does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the population trend criterion (>30% decline over ten years or three generations). The population size has not been quantified, but it is not believed to approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the population size criterion (<10,000 mature individuals with a continuing decline estimated to be >10% in ten years or three generations, or with a specified population structure). For these reasons the species is evaluated as Least Concern.

Ceyx mindanensis is endemic to the Philippines, where it is known from the islands of Mindanao and Basilan (Collar et al. 1999).

This species is poorly known. Described by Allen (2020) as local and uncommon, and the paucity of observations of this species in citizen science data (eBird 2024) would ostensibly suggest that it is a rare species. However, Ceyx are cryptic and have low detectability, with mist-netting often proving dwarf-kingfishers previously thought of as quite rare, to be quite common. This species' former conspecific, North Philippine Dwarf-kingfisher Ceyx melanurus, for example, similarly has fewer records in citizen science data, but was found to be common during mist-netting (e.g. Gomez et al. 2009). It seems likely therefore that Ceyx mindanensis is commoner than records suggest, especially given its tolerances of heavily degraded forest (see, e.g., de Leon et al. 2018). While its population size is therefore recorded as unknown, given the size of Mindanao (nearly 100,000 km²), the global population size is unlikely to be small.

It is a lowland specialist, inhabiting forest understorey and secondary growth/open forest from sea-level to at least 750 m, perhaps up to 1,000 m.

The only identified threat to this species is forest loss and modification, although it is also tolerant of degraded forest. Nonetheless, it is probably declining (slowly) in response to forest losses, which are mostly caused by shifting agriculture and conversion to (mostly rubber) plantations.