This species was first described by Arthur Gardiner Butler in 1879 and named Scopula notata.

[2] In 2010 the publication The New Zealand Inventory of Biodiversity placed this species in the genus Udea.

[3][4] However this placement was brought into doubt by the work of Richard Mally and Matthias Nuss.

The discoidal area is dusky and there is a black-edged white rhomboidal spot at the end of the cell, as well as a grey discal line, arched beyond the cell and with a zigzag course from the first median branch to the inner margin.

The hindwings are pale creamy ochreous, speckled at the apex and on the basal area with grey scales.