The Gray Flycatcher, Empidonax wrightii, is an insect-eating bird. It is a small Empidonax flycatcher, with typical length ranging from 14–16 cm.

Adults have pale gray upperparts, darker on the wings and tail, with whitish underparts; they have a conspicuous white eye ring, white wing bars, a small bill and a short tail. The breast is a dull white. This is the only Empidonax flycatcher which regularly pumps its tail gently downward.

Many species of this genus look closely alike. The best way to distinguish species is by voice, breeding habitat, and range. This species, however, is one of the easiest to identify by plumage (plain gray) and behavior (downward tail motion).

Gray Flycatchers' preferred breeding habitat is arid sagebrush and Pinyon Pine of the Great Basin in the western United States. They are frequently found as vagrants in coastal California. A small breeding population extends over the United States border into southernmost British Columbia in Canada. They make a cup nest on a fork in a tree, usually low in a horizontal branch. Females usually lay 3–4 eggs.

These birds migrate for the winter to Mexico, specifically Baja California Sur, the Pacific Coast from central Sonora south to Nayarit, and the interior south rarely to Oaxaca (Howell and Webb 1995).

They wait on an open perch of a shrub or low branch of a tree and fly out to catch insects in flight, (hawking), also sometimes picking insects from foliage while hovering.

The song is a multi versed chiwip, wilip, sung together in different combinations. The call is a loud wit.