Their hind legs are modified for jumping, and are covered with hairs that facilitate the spreading of a secretion over their bodies that acts as a water repellent and carrier of pheromones.

[4] The Cicadellidae combine the following features: An additional and unique character of leafhoppers is the production of brochosomes, which are thought to protect the animals, and particularly their egg clutches, from predation as well as pathogens.

Leafhoppers are also susceptible to various insect pathogens, including Dicistroviridae viruses, bacteria and fungi; numerous parasitoids attack the eggs and the adults provide food for small insectivores.

Some species such as the Australian Kahaono montana even build silk nests under the leaves of trees they live in, to protect them from predators.

[8]In the now-obsolete classification that was used throughout much of the 20th century, the leafhoppers were part of the Homoptera, a paraphyletic assemblage uniting the basal lineages of Hemiptera and ranked as suborder.

Hence, a recent trend treats the most advanced hemipterans as three or four lineages, namely Archaeorrhyncha (Fulgoromorpha if included in Auchenorrhyncha), Coleorrhyncha and Heteroptera (sometimes united as Prosorrhyncha) and Clypeorrhyncha.