It is watery and darker compared to that of the honey from honey bees. Ripened honey seldom exceeds 70 per cent sugar content and is more watery than honey from honey bees. It does not ferment in the nests presumably due to the resin chemicals and hydrogen peroxide. Honey from stingless bee nests rarely exceeds more than a litre. This is in contrast to the Malaysian giant honey bee Apis dorsata, which can store several dozen kilograms of honey in a single comb.
Stingless bees are important pollinators of plants in the forest.
Bees account for the pollination of 70 species of timber trees and 14 species of non-timber trees. They are generalists, where only a few species seem to forage on many plant species. For example, it has been observed that Trigona erythrogstra differed in the plants foraged from that of T. geisllerri although there are overlaps. While stingless bees are generalists, four other species, two of which belonging to the Tetragonulids , and the other two belonging to the Heterotrigonids , forage more specifically. They have been considered as opportunistic pollinators of plants that provide minimal rewards within under-storey forest strata.