Netwinged insects are named for large, delicate, transparent wings with branching patterns of veins. When resting, they make a tent shape with their wings, protecting their long, soft body underneath. A horizontal line divides each of their big, round eyes into upper and lower sections. Netwings tend to have long antennae, sometimes club-shaped on the end. Their petite, but powerful jaws are used to feed on small animals such as aphids or ants. The body plan of a larval netwing is radically different from its parents. Larvae have flattened heads with large jaws that may be long and spiny. Their jaws include tubes, allowing them to suck the contents of prey out after they have stabbed it. Some larval netwings are called "antlions" because they dig sand traps to capture and eat unsuspecting ants. Thanks to their predatory abilities, netwings are used in agriculture to control other insect pests that damage crops.

An insect has a brain, connected to bundles of nerves (ganglia) in each of its three body segments. Like us, they have sensory nerves that receive information from their environment and send it to the brain. Information comes from many types of touch receptors. Touch-sensitive hairs all over an insect's body are sensitive enough to detect vibrations in the air, such as from an approaching predator. Insect hairs also do chemical detection (chemoreception). Pores at the end of chemoreceptors on mouthparts or other body parts allow odors to reach the nervous system. Insect antennae may have thousands of chemoreceptors, used to detect chemicals in the air (pheromones) emitted by members of the opposite sex. An insect, like us, has a pair of eyes on its head. But, insect eyes are compound, with hundreds or thousands of lenses, together making an image consisting of spots of light, like pixels. An insect's sound receptors are on its legs.