Ficus microcarpa has been described in 1782 by Carl Linnaeus the Younger. The species has a considerable number of synonyms. In 1965, E. J. H. Corner described seven varieties (and two forms of Ficus microcarpa var. microcarpa)[4] which were regarded as synonyms under the name of Ficus microcarpa in the latest[which?] Flora Malesiana volume.
Hill's weeping fig was first formally described as a species, Ficus hillii, by Frederick Manson Bailey in the Botany Bulletin of the Queensland Department of Agriculture, based on the type specimen collected in the "scrubs of tropical Queensland'".[5] In 1965, it was reassigned by E. J .H. Corner as a variety of F. microcarpa, namely F. microcarpa var. hillii.[4]