Small tree to 7 m tall. Forming a lignotuber.Bark smooth, seasonally powdery, creamy white to yellowish and greeny bronze, shedding in short ribbons.Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stem rounded in cross-section, conspicuously warty, reddish but with some wax; juvenile leaves opposite and usually sessile for many nodes (occasionally a short petiole to 0.2 cm), elliptical, 2.5–4.5 cm long, 1–2.5 cm wide, base rounded, margin entire, apex acute to apiculate, concolorous, bluish grey to glaucous.Adult leaves alternate, petiole 0.9–2.0 cm long; blade elliptical to falcate, 4.5–11 cm long, 0.8–1.5 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, margin entire, apex pointed, concolorous, dull, blue-grey to glaucous, side-veins acute, reticulation sparse, intramarginal vein parallel to and close to margin, oil glands island.Inflorescence axillary unbranched, peduncles 0.2–0.9 cm long, buds 7, 9 and 11 per umbel, sessile or with pedicels to 0.3 cm long. Mature buds clavate, ca 0.3–0.5 cm long and 0.2–0.3 cm wide, slightly glaucous, scar absent, operculum rounded with a nipple at top or not, stamens irregularly flexed, anthers reniform to cordate, versatile, dorsifixed, dehiscing by confluent slits, style short, stigma tapered, locules 3, 4 or 5, the placentae each with 2 vertical ovule rows. Flowers creamy white.Fruit sessile or on pedicels to 0.3 cm long, hemispherical or weakly obconical, 0.3–0.5 cm long, 0.3–0.6 cm wide, disc usually level, valves 3, 4 or 5, near rim level.Seeds brown to reddish brown, 1.2–2 mm long, pyramidal or obliquely pyramidal, dorsal surface smooth, hilum terminal. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): (not grown): cotyledons reniform.
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