Type species Rissoina gigantea Deshayes (1863).
Nevill proposed Moerchiella for large rissoinids with the early whorls clathrately sculptured, the later ones spirally lirate only. He included a number of species from the Red Sea, the Andamans, Mauritius, the Philippines, and New Caledonia. Following Nevill, later authors have included under Moerchiella all large species with discrepant sculpture. In this wider sense the generic description needs amplification, as many species are not clathrate on the early whorls, but have axial ribs only, and the later whorls may be striate or quite smooth. Other characteristics are the rather thin shell, the absence of a varix, and the expanded aperture, which is very oblique, the anterior margin thrust forward like a scoop or shovel. A curious feature is that many species are liable to an irregularity of growth, producing distortion in the later
whorls.
Melvill's Chiliostigma refugiana , described as a new subgenus and species from the Gulf of Oman, seems close to Moerchiella, having a large shell of similar form, but the sculpture is described as "close longitudinal striation with interstitial, close, spiral pitting". None of the Australian species comes here.

Genus Moerchiella Nevill, 1885
Type species: Moerchiella gigantea (Deshayes, 1863)
Diagnosis: Shell similar to Zebina but ribbed on earlier whorls. Some authors put it under Zebina as subgenus.