A novel Gram-staining-positive actinobacterium, designated H85-3(T), was isolated from a sea sediment sample and its taxonomic position was investigated by a polyphasic approach. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequence comparisons revealed that strain H85-3(T) was closely related to the members of the genus Zhihengliuella with pairwise sequence similarities of 97.4-98.6 %. The peptidoglycan of strain H85-3(T) was found to be of the A4α type with lysine as the diagnostic diamino acid. The menaquinones were MK-9, MK-10 and MK-8 (56 : 30 : 14) and the major cellular fatty acids were anteiso-C15 : 0, iso-C15 : 0 and anteiso-C17 : 0. These data supported the affiliation of strain H85-3(T) to the genus Zhihengliuella. Meanwhile, the results of DNA-DNA hybridization, along with the differences in some phenotypic characteristics, indicated that strain H85-3(T) should be distinguished from the recognized species of the genus Zhihengliuella. Therefore, strain H85-3(T) represents a novel species of the genus Zhihengliuella, for which the name Zhihengliuella flava sp. nov. is proposed; the type strain is H85-3(T) ( = NBRC 109021(T) = DSM 26152(T)). An emended description of the genus Zhihengliuella is also proposed.