The striped boarfish has a very deep body which is steep behind the head and rounded underneath the soft part of the dorsal fin.

The dorsal fin is tall and sail-like, contains 4 or 5 stout spines and 26-28 soft rays and has a convex margin towards the rear.

There are five wide dark stripes on the body, and the dorsal, anal and caudal fins are yellow.

It prefers deeper reefs, and is often found near deep rocky drop-offs or over areas of sand substrate at depths of 10–180 metres (33–591 ft).

[4] The striped boarfish is the only species in the monospecific genus Evistias[5] and was first formally described as Histiopterus acutirostris in 1844 by Coenraad Jacob Temminck and Hermann Schlegel with the type locality given as Ōmura near Nagasaki on Kyūshū.