The Australian Painted-Snipe lives in shallow wetlands and searches for food from dusk into the night. Females are more brightly colored than males.
Females are more brightly colored than males. A female has a dark brown head and upper breast, a rufous hindneck, and finely barred upperparts.
It forages from dusk through the night, probing soft mud with its long bill for seeds and small invertebrates.
It nests in a shallow ground scrape among grasses or reeds, lined with grass and leaves. Clutches contain two to six eggs, usually three or four, and the male incubates for 15–21 days.
Chicks can move and leave the nest soon after hatching, but remain dependent and are brooded by the male during their first few days. Breeding responds to rain and wetland conditions and has been recorded in every month in Australia.
Males have mottled gray-brown heads and necks with a pale crown stripe, black, buff and white spots on the back and wings, and a broad dark breast band. Juvenile plumage closely resembles the adult male.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.