Tree to 18 m tall. Forming a lignotuber.Bark rough but thin and more or less loose on part or all of trunk, fibrous, grey-brown; branches smooth pale grey to creamy.Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stems square in cross-section, sometimes winged, slightly glaucous, slightly warty or smooth; juvenile leaves opposite and sessile for many pairs, highly variable in shape and size, from orbicular to ovate, 3.5–12.5 cm long, 3–11.5 cm wide, bases amplexicaul, apex rounded to pointed (mucronate), margin entire or subcrenulate, slightly discolorous, glossy green above, sometimes slightly glaucous below, usually thick-textured.Adult leaves alternate, petiole 2–4 cm long; blade lanceolate to falcate, 12–21(35) cm long, 2–3.3(4.5) cm wide, base tapering to petiole or rounded, concolorous, glossy, green, side-veins greater than 45° to midrib, densely reticulate, intramarginal vein parallel to and well removed from margin, oil glands mostly island.Inflorescence axillary unbranched, peduncles broad, 1–2.4 cm long, buds 7 per umbel, sessile or on pedicels to 0.4 cm long. Mature buds cylindrical to more or less fusiform, usually with faint longitudinal angles, 1–1.4 cm long, 0.4–0.6 cm wide, scar present, operculum conical, stamens irregularly flexed, anthers cuneate to oblong, versatile, dorsifixed, dehiscing by longitudinal slits (non-confluent), style long, stigma blunt, locules 3 or 4, the placentae each with 4 vertical ovule rows. Flowers white.Fruit sessile or pedicellate (pedicels 0–0.3 cm long), cylindrical, cup-shaped or barrel-shaped, 0.7–1.1(1.3) cm long, 0.7–1.1 cm wide, often angled longitudinally, disc descending, valves 3 or 4, near rim level or enclosed.Seeds dark grey, brown or black, 2–3 mm long, ovoid to flattened-ovoid, often pointed at one end, sometimes lacunose, dorsal surface shallowly pitted, hilum ventral. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons bilobed; stems rounded or square in cross-section, glaucous; leaves sessile and opposite for many nodes, ovate to orbicular, 5.5–6.5 cm long, 3–6 cm wide, base amplexicaul, margin subcrenulate or entire, apex broadly pointed, glaucous at first becoming green and slightly to quite glossy.
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