Principal crop hosts include beans, broccoli, cabbage, carnation, carrot, cauliflower, Chinese broccoli, cotton, cucumber, garlic, head cabbage, leek, melon, onion, orchids, papaya, peas, pineapple, rose, squash, tobacco, tomato, and turnip. This thrips was first found in Hawaii in 1915 and is now present on all islands.
Thrips feed by piercing individual cells and sucking the contents.
These cells lose their normal color, and when many adjacent cells are damaged, the tissue appears as whitish spots or silvery spots or streaks. In advanced injury the leaves take on a blasted appearance. As is common with many thrips species, onion thrips deposit small dark specks of excrement on the surface of tissue where they feed. Substantial damage can be done to young plants especially to varieties grown in seed beds. Besides direct damage caused by feeding of larvae and adults, this pest is also important as a vector of tomato spotted wilt virus and has been involved in transmitting the disease in pineapple, tomatoes, and certain other crops.