The nominate adult's most striking features are its long white supercilium, throat, and upper breast.

Subspecies S. s. santabarbarae is darker, with upper parts trending to chestnut and the underparts being blackish-brown instead of gray.

Subspecies S. s. santabarbarae is probably limited to the Santa Bárbara Mountains of Jujuy, though it might also extend into Salta Province.

[3] The white-browed tapaculo inhabits the undergrowth of Alnus and Polylepis woodlands, often in shaded rocky ravines.

[3] The white-browed tapaculo's song is "a single burred note...followed after short pause by drawn-out descending “churr”..., repeated for several minutes at [a] regular pace" [1].