It is a member of the family Meliphagidae (honeyeaters and Australian chats) which has 190 recognised species with about half of them found in Australia.

White-eared honeyeaters are easily identifiable by their olive-green body, black head and white ear-patch.

[6][2] It is a sister taxon to the yellow-throated honeyeater (N. flavicollis) that occurs in Tasmania, and they belong to a clade that contains the genera Entomyzon, Melithreptus, and Foulehaio.

[3] The white-eared honeyeater's preferred habitat is in forests, woodlands, heathlands, mallee and dry inland scrublands.

[3] A eucalyptus canopy, rough bark and a shrub layer are the most important requirements for white-eared honeyeaters.

Proposals that this subspecies may, in fact, consist of two races, on either side of the Great Dividing Range, have recently been confirmed with the description of race schoddei from mallee woodland on the Eyre Peninsula, west to near the head of the Great Australian Bight, north-west through the Gawler Ranges and the Yellabinna region, at least to Maralinga.

[17] Evidence for this is that the populations on the eastern, coastal side of the Great Dividing Range have intense green upperparts, and are light greenish-yellow on the belly, whereas, populations in the western, inland side of the Great Dividing Range are a duller olive colour and become slightly smaller.

The nest is built among tangled twigs and leaves, low in a small shrub, bracken or coarse grass from 0.5 to 5 m high.

[3] The cup-shaped nest is constructed out of dry grass, fine stems, thin strips of bark and held together with cobwebs.

[3] White-eared honeyeaters will pluck fur and hairs from livestock, humans, and native wildlife, such as kangaroos and wallabies.

[8] White-eared honeyeaters form territories, which can expand during winter when some key resources are in lower densities.

[25] Although the white-eared honeyeater has a decreasing population, it has an extensive distribution, and is considered to be of least concern on the IUCN Red List.