The plant hormone receptor ETR1 regulates many highly relevant agronomic processes. Today, significant functional and structural questions remain unanswered regarding its multi-pass transmembrane sensor domain able to bind and respond to the gaseous plant hormone ethylene at femtomolar concentrations. A significant reason for this is the lack of structural data on full-length ETR1 in a lipid environment. Herein, we present the functional reconstitution of recombinant full-length ETR1 purified and solubilized from a bacterial host into lipid nanodiscs, allowing the study of the purified plant receptor for the first time in a detergent-free membrane-like environment.