Most of the wrist-winged gliders are native to Australia, whereas most of the striped possums to New Guinea, but some members of each group are found on both sides of the Torres Strait.

All petaurids have obvious facial markings, a well-defined dorsal stripe, very large lower front incisors, and four-cusped molars.

Despite their distinctive appearance, petaurids are closely related to the ringtail possums (family Pseudocheiridae) and are grouped together with them to form the superfamily Petauroidea.

The wrist-winged gliders are omnivorous, specialising on sap and nectar, but taking a wide variety of supplemental foods.

All members of this genus are insectivores, and have specialised structures for catching insects: a heel-like structure on the wrist that is thought to be used to tap on wood to locate insect larvae, and an elongated fourth finger to extract them from their burrows.