It has a single leaf and up to twenty pale green to yellowish flowers with red markings and a labellum with a greenish "beard".

Calochilus holtzei is a terrestrial, perennial, deciduous, herb with an underground tuber and a single leaf which is fully developed at flowering time, 300–550 mm (10–20 in) long, 10–20 mm (0.4–0.8 in) wide and triangular in cross section.

[2] Calochilus holtzei was first formally described in 1892 by Ferdinand von Mueller and the description was published in The Victorian Naturalist from specimens collected near Port Darwin by Maurice William Holtze.

[3][4] The specific epithet (holtzei) honours the collector of the type specimen.

[4] The ghostly beard orchid grows with grasses in forest and woodland in the northern Kimberley region of Western Australia and on Melville Island in the Northern Territory.