[2][1][3] It was first described by Carl Benjamin Klunzinger, a German physician and zoologist active in the Red Sea region in the 1860s, and classifying its species in the 1870s and 1880s.

Porites nodifera have a hard substrate and grow in column-like structures toward the surface of the water.

Salinity is an ecological factor which limits the lower zones of coral reefs so the species is able to dominate the lowest zones of the Dahab Reef in Egypt in particular, forming a considerable single species stand.

There is only one species in this area that co-exists in the lowest zone of the reef slope in very sparse numbers; millepora sp.

Porites nodifera can also be found in areas of normal Red Sea salinities (4.0-4.2%), but does not tend to dominate these zones because of interspecific competition from a variety of other coral species.