Shrub to small or medium-sized tree, dioecious or monoecious, 4—15(—25) m tall with open spreading crown; trunk 7-10 cm ø; young stems reddish; bark light grey to brown, smooth; blaze red and wood white, soft. Leaves elliptic-lanceolate to lanceolate, 4-17 by 1.5-4.5 cm, distinctly acuminate at the apex, cuneate at the base, minutely to coarsely ser-rate, save near the base, thinly coriaceous; nerves 12-25 pairs; petioles slender, 0.5-2.7 cm; stipules 1-3 mm long on leaf sheaths 1-5 mm long; leafless nodes occur. Inflorescences green, yellowish or purple, many-flowered, lax, terminal and in the upper axils; main axis 3-branched, the central branch again 2-3-branched but some axillary inflorescences simple; individual branches slender, 3-12 cm long, the flowers closely placed, each subtended by 3 bracteoles scarcely 1 mm long; lower main bracts of inflorescence up to c. 1 cm long consisting of a sheath with lateral projections; upper bracts ovate-acuminate, 3 mm long. Inflorescence glomerules consisting basically of an abaxial male flower and adaxial female flower but more usually unisexual. Male flowers with 1 stamen; anthers 2-4 mm long, scarcely 1 mm wide (reported purple in Fiji specimen), with a minute deltoid apical projection. Female flowers: ovary green, ovoid, 1.5 mm long; stigma between translucent and white or purple, 0.8-1.3 mm wide. Fruit ellipsoid, 2-3 by 1.2-2.5 mm; exocarp thin and slightly wrinkled in dry state; endocarp rounded ellipsoid, ± 1.5 by 1.2 mm, compressed, the margin keeled, surfaces warty-papillate.
Rain-forest, cloud-forest with Pandanus, 900-1800 m. Male fl. Feb., Aug.; fr.--05.
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