The genus Anacolia, with 7 species world-wide (Crosby et al. 2000), has sclerodermous stems, narrow, non-sheathing, appressed leaves, short setae, and capsules that are rugose to wrinkled when dry. Anacolia often has trailing pleurocarpous-like plants with apparently lateral setae, but the genus is acrocarpous. The perichaetia are originally terminal and later become laterally displaced by subperichaetial innovations.

Griffin and Buck (1989) segregated the genus Flowersia for those species of Anacolia that have centrally papillose leaf cells, axillary hairs with elongate terminal cells, and curved setae. This treatment is not followed here in part because seta stance is a variable feature in both genera, and  papillae position with the Bartramiaceae is extremely variable, e.g., the same papillae variation is present in Philonotis. The terminal cell character of the axillary hairs is a distinctive feature that clearly separates the two taxa. The importance of this feature at the generic level is questionable since some species in Bartramia (Bartramia stricta), Leiomela (Leiomela deciduifolia), and Breutelia (Breutelia affinis), genera that commonly have axillary hairs with elongate terminal cells, have axillary hairs with globose terminal cells.

Anacolia may not be generically distinct from Bartramia. In general, Bartramia differs from Anacolia in having multistratose leaf limbs, sheathing leaf bases, a well-developed stem hyalodermis, and furrowed capsules. There are, however, species of Bartramia with leaves undifferentiated at base, leaf limbs bistratose only at the margins, or that lack a stem hyalodermis. The value of rugose vs. furrowed capsules as an indicator of generic importance in the Bartramiaceae is questionable since both furrowed and rugose capsules can be found in species of Philonotis and Breutelia.