It bears linear to lanceolate scales 3 millimeters (0.1 in) long, of a uniform light brown color (or somewhat darker at the base), with entire (toothless) margins.

Both stipe and rachis (leaf axis) are round and black, lacking hairs, scales or glands and occasionally bearing a very sparse coating of white farina (powder).

[6] The description is based on material collected by Charles Christopher Parry and Edward Palmer in San Luis Potosi, the latter of whom is honored by the specific epithet.

[1] While Tryon considered it impossible to reasonably subdivide Notholaena into sections based on the data available at the time,[7] both Edwin Copeland and Weatherby himself had suggested in the 1940s that a group of ferns related to N. nivea might represent a distinct genus of its own.

[10] In 2018, Maarten J. M. Christenhusz transferred the species to Hemionitis as H. palmeri, as part of a program to consolidate the cheilanthoid ferns into that genus.

[12] Argyrochosma pallens is endemic to north-central Mexico, occurring in Durango, Guanajuato, and San Luis Potosi.