[1] It bears thin,[2] linear scales 4 millimeters (0.2 in) long, of an orange-brown to dark-brown color, with entire (toothless) margins.

Both stipe and rachis (leaf axis) are round and of a dark purplish color, bearing sparse, drooping hairs.

[3] The under side of each leaf is covered with white farina (powder) and bears some multicellular hairs 1 to 2 millimeters (0.04 to 0.08 in) long, similar to those on stipe and rachis.

The hairs on the axes and underside of the leaf distinguish it from similar species in the genus,[4] and presumably inspired the epithet pilifera, meaning "hair-bearing".

[5] While Tryon considered it impossible to reasonably subdivide Notholaena into sections based on the data available at the time,[6] 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.

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