Indo-Pacific: Red Sea and East Africa to the Ryukyu Islands, Tonga, and Samoa.

The body is light tan or olive to brown, becoming lighter below. the centers of the scales are often lighter than the background color. The head, often, has several broad indistinct vertical and diagonal light and dark bands. Sometimes there are white spots below the eye. The posterior edge of the operculum is dark brown. An orange-yellow stripe is on the lower part of the side with two additional more faint orange-yellow stripes above and one below this stripe. The fins are whitish or tan, sometimes mottled.

Found over seagrass beds, sand and rubble areas of lagoons and reefs.