Director Carlos Saldanha, who lives in Rio, first came up with the concept in 1995. Originally, it was about a penguin washing up on the beach in the Brazilian city. When he learned about the production of Happy Feet: O Pinguim (2006) and Tá Dando Onda (2007), he changed his screenplay radically.
During production, Jesse Eisenberg was still working on A Rede Social (2010). To compensate for time, he agreed to provide Blu's dialogue on weekends, admitting that it diverted him away from the mindset of his nearly-joyless Social Network character.
The film was based on a true story of a Spix's macaw named Elvis, living in the United States. His owner agreed to let Elvis join the captive breeding program to help preserve his species.
This film has been cited as a reason why Pixar cancelled "Newt," a film with a similar story.
When Blu tells Jewel to check his math to verify that his plan to break their chain will work, a patch of sand is shown where Blu has scratched in the equation "f=G (m1 x m2 / R^2)". This is the formula for calculating the gravitational attraction between two bodies and can apply both literally to the rock and chain/Earth, as well as figuratively to Blu and Jewel.