The German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin described the bird with the species name "franciae" (referring to France) in 1789, and the French naturalist Pierre Joseph Bonnaterre used the name "batavica" (referring to Batavia) in his 1790 description. In 1840 the English zoologist George Robert Gray named a new genus, "Alectroenas", for the Mauritius blue pigeon; "alektruon" in Greek means domestic cock, and "oinas" means dove. "Alectroenas nitidissima" is the type species of the genus, which includes all blue pigeons. The specific name was emended from "A. nitidissimus" to "A. nitidissima" by the IOC World Bird List in 2012.