The shell of this species is glossy, convolute and lemon-shaped, with 20-30 transverse ridges.

More developed larvae in the veliger stage have a two-lobed velum (a structure used for swimming and particulate food collection) that is slightly indented at sides.

This species occurs from the Mediterranean Sea to the Shetland archipelago in the north of Scotland, but is more common in the south.

In Orkney and some parts of Scotland, the species are known as 'groatie buckies' and are popular with local collectors.

Trivia monacha lacks small denticles on the admedian teeth of the radula.

In fact they were considered to be two forms of the same species until 1925, when Alfred James Peile published a paper in the Proceedings of the Malacological Society differentiating the two.

The Linnaean name Trivia europea, now lapsed, referred to the supposed single species.