Shrubs , subevergreen or evergreen, low, rhizomatous, forming clonal patches of straight, often unbranched stems 0.2-0.7(-2) m. Bark light gray or brown, smooth. Twigs light gray, 1.5-3 mm diam., glabrous or very finely tomentulose and glabrate in 2d year. Buds dark gray-brown, globose, 0.5-1(-1.5) mm; scale margins glabrous or puberulent. Leaves dimorphic; petiole 1-4(-10) mm. Leaf blade obovate to oblanceolate, sometimes orbiculate or lance-ovate, often asymmetric, 40-120 × 20-50 mm proximally on shoots, narrowly elliptic, 20-60 × 5-20 mm distally on shoots, base cuneate, rarely truncate or cordate, margins minutely revolute or flat, coarsely and irregularly 1-5 toothed on each side (proximal leaves of shoots) or entire (distal leaves on shoots), teeth mucronate (rarely spinose in suckers or juveniles), secondary veins obscure, 4-10(-12) on each side, usually 4-6 in proximal leaves, apex obtuse-rounded or acute; surfaces abaxially whitish or glaucous, densely covered with minute, appressed, fused-stellate hairs, light green and glabrate in shade leaves, adaxially dark or light green, glossy, glabrous or with minute, scattered, stellate hairs. Acorns 1-3, on peduncle 3-30 mm; cup hemispheric or deeply goblet-shaped, (8-)10-15 mm deep × 6-15 mm wide, base often constricted, scales whitish or grayish, thickened basally, keeled, acute-attenuate, tomentulose, tips reddish, glabrous or puberulent; nut dark brown, narrowly ovoid or subcylindric, 13-22(-25) × 8-15 mm, glabrous. Cotyledons connate.
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