Slender mallet to 10 m tall. Lacking a lignotuber.Bark smooth throughout, rarely powdery, pale grey to whitish over orange to pale brown, shedding in long ribbons.Branchlets have oil glands in the pith. Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings): stems rounded in cross-section; juvenile leaves always petiolate, opposite at lowest node only then becoming alternate, lanceolate, 5.5–8 cm long, ca 1.3–3.5 cm wide, lowest leaves dull, bluish but soon glossy, green.Adult leaves alternate, petioles 1–2 cm long; blade lanceolate, 6.2–11 cm long, (0.6)0.7 –1.5 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, margin entire, apex pointed, concolorous, very glossy, green, side-veins at an acute or wider angle to midrib or sometimes obscure, reticulation dense to very dense, intramarginal vein close to margin, oil glands numerous, intersectional.Inflorescence axillary unbranched, peduncles 0.4–2(3.1) cm long, buds 3 per umbel, pedicellate, pedicels (0.3)0.5–0.8(1.1) cm long. Mature buds pyriform to obovoid (0.8–1 cm long, 0.6–0.9 cm wide) with up to 12 distinct radial ribs on operculum, less prominently ribbed on hypanthium, scar present (outer operculum shed early in development), inner operculum rounded to somewhat flattened (0.35–0.5 cm long), stamens regularly inflexed, all fertile, cuboid to wedge shaped versatile anthers, dorsifixed, dehiscing by longitudinal slits, style long and straight, stigma blunt, locules 4(5), the placentae each with 4 vertical rows of ovules. Flowers creamy white.Fruit pedicellate, pedicels (0.2)0.3–0.7(1.1) cm long, usually obconical or cupular-obconical, sometimes campanulate, 0.8–1.2 cm long, 0.8–1 cm wide, shallowly to distinctly but sparingly ribbed, disc descending obliquely, valves 4(5), near rim level.Seeds reddish to brown and glossy, 1.2–3 mm long, flattened-ovoid and often angular in outline, sometimes lacunose, dorsal surface scarcely reticulate, hilum ventral.Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons reniform; stems square in cross-section, scarcely glaucous or non-glaucous; leaves always petiolate, opposite for 3 to 5 nodes then alternate, lanceolate, 6.5–8.5 cm long, 2–3 cm wide, green, becoming glossy, but maybe with slight waxiness when young.
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