Called pinkgills in English, basidiocarps (fruit bodies) are agaricoid, mostly (but not always) mycenoid (like species of Mycena) with slender stems.

Recent DNA evidence has shown that at least 12 species belong in Leptonia in temperate Europe and Asia.

[1] Leptonia was introduced in 1821 by the Swedish mycologist Elias Magnus Fries as a "tribe" of Agaricus comprising small, slender agarics with convex to flat caps and pink spores.

[3] Recent molecular research, based on cladistic analysis of DNA sequences, has shown that Leptonia, as previously defined, was paraphyletic (an artificial grouping).

[4] By excluding species unrelated to the type, however, Leptonia has been redefined as a monophyletic (natural) grouping.