A pale-yellowish-pigmented strain, 022-2-26(T), was isolated from a starfish, Stellaster equestris. Cells of strain 022-2-26(T) were Gram-negative short rods that were chemo-organotrophic, alkalitolerant and mesophilic. The predominant menaquinone was MK-6. The major cellular fatty acids were iso-C(15 : 0), iso-C(15 : 1), C(15 : 0), iso-C(15 : 0) 2-OH and iso-C(17 : 0) 3-OH (together representing 87 % of the total fatty acids). The DNA G+C content was 30.1 mol%. A 16S rRNA gene sequence of the isolate was determined and phylogenetic analyses revealed that strain 022-2-26(T) formed a robust clade (neighbour-joining algorithm with a bootstrap value of 95 % and parsimony and maximum-likelihood algorithms) with type strains of species in the genus Winogradskyella. The closest phylogenetic neighbour of strain 022-2-26(T) was Winogradskyella poriferorum UST030701-295(T) (96 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity; 59 differences between sequences). On the basis of the phenotypic and chemotaxonomic characteristics and the phylogenetic evidence, it is proposed that strain 022-2-26(T) represents a novel species, Winogradskyella exilis sp. nov. The type strain is 022-2-26(T) (=KMM 6013(T) =CIP 109976(T)).