The fur is long and soft. This genus lacks the pale rings around the eyes that are characteristic of nearly all other elephant shrews. The underparts are white or grayish. The ears are shorter and rounder than those of other genera of elephant shrews. The first digit of the hind limb is small and bears a claw.
Females have six mammae.
The short-eared elephant shrew dwells on sandy and gravelly thornbush plains. It often excavates shallow burrows under bushes. These burrows have an ordinary entrance and an emergency exit, the latter being inconspicuous and almost perpendicular to the ground. This elephant shrew sometimes shelters in the warrens of the murid rodents of the subfamily Otomyinae. In Great Namaqualand, at least near Berseba, Macroscelides and Elephantulus rupestris often occur together in about equal numbers.