diff --git a/pandas/io/pytables.py b/pandas/io/pytables.py
index 88b444acfea62..25cabbb7c61b9 100644
--- a/pandas/io/pytables.py
+++ b/pandas/io/pytables.py
@@ -348,19 +348,15 @@ def read_hdf(
 
     Parameters
     ----------
-    path_or_buf : str, path object, pandas.HDFStore or file-like object
-        Any valid string path is acceptable. The string could be a URL. Valid
-        URL schemes include http, ftp, s3, and file. For file URLs, a host is
-        expected. A local file could be: ``file://localhost/path/to/table.h5``.
+    path_or_buf : str, path object, pandas.HDFStore
+        Any valid string path is acceptable. Only supports the local file system,
+        remote URLs and file-like objects are not supported.
 
         If you want to pass in a path object, pandas accepts any
         ``os.PathLike``.
 
         Alternatively, pandas accepts an open :class:`pandas.HDFStore` object.
 
-        By file-like object, we refer to objects with a ``read()`` method,
-        such as a file handle (e.g. via builtin ``open`` function)
-        or ``StringIO``.
     key : object, optional
         The group identifier in the store. Can be omitted if the HDF file
         contains a single pandas object.