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An endosymbiotic bacterium of the genusSodalis, designated as strain HZ^T, was cultured from the parasitoid waspSpalangia cameroni, which develops on the pupae of various host flies. The bacterium was detected inS. cameronideveloped on houseflies,Musca domestica, in a poultry facility in Hazon, northern Israel. After culturing, this bacterium displayed no surface motility on Luria–Bertani agar and was rod-shaped and irregular in size, ~10–30 nm in diameter and 5–20 µm in length. Phylogenetic analyses revealed that strain HZ^Tis closely related toSodalis praecaptivusstrain HS^T, a free-living species of the genusSodalisthat includes many insect endosymbionts. Although these bacteria maintain >98% sequence identity in shared genes, genomic characterization revealed that strain HZ^Thas undergone substantial reductive evolution, such that it lacks many gene functions that are maintained inS. praecaptivusstrain HS^T. Based on the results of phylogenetic, genomic and chemotaxonomic analyses, we propose that this endosymbiont should be classified in a new subspecies asS. praecaptivussubsp. spalangiaesubsp. nov. The type strain for this new subspecies is HZ^T(=ATCC TSD-398^T=NCIMB 15482^T). The subspeciesSodalis praecaptivussubsp.praecaptivusstrain HS^Tis created automatically with the type strain ATCC BAA-2554^T(=DSMZ 27494^T).