[2] The family was circumscribed in 2010 by the lichenologists Elisabeth Baloch, Robert Lücking, H. Thorsten Lumbsch, and Mats Wedin.

[2] Members of the Sagiolechiaceae typically form crust-like (crustose) thalli, often containing green algae of the genus Trentepohlia as their photosynthetic partners.

[2] Their reproductive structures, the apothecia, begin immersed in the thallus but later emerge and sit atop it (becoming sessile).

They are colourless (hyaline) and react with iodine-based staining tests, indicating the presence of starch-like compounds (amyloid).

The spores themselves are colourless, divided by internal walls (transversely septate or partitioned into multiple compartments, known as muriform).