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A shrub which loses its leaves during the year. It grows 1.5 to 10 m tall. The bark is smooth and grey-brown. The leaves are thin and papery without hairs. The are oval with a pointed tip. They are about 13 cm long by 6 cm wide. There are 7-11 main veins on each side of the midrib. The network of veins can be seen underneath the leaf. The leaf stalk is 7 mm long. The flowers grow beside the leaves. They are greenish-white and in much branched bunches. The flowers are like tiny tubes. The fruit is green but becomes yellow brown when ripe. The fruit is round and 17-20 mm long. The fruit is edible.
Leaves 3–15(17) × 1.5–6(8) cm, elliptic, oblong, ovate or ovate-lanceolate to lanceolate, distinctly acuminate at the apex, rounded to cuneate or occasionally subcordate at the base, often discolorous and venose beneath when dry, quite glabrous or rarely slightly pubescent beneath; lateral nerves in (6)7–8 main pairs; tertiary nerves finely reticulate; petiole 7–10(14) mm long; stipules with filiform part 3–9.5 mm long from a short broad base 1.5–2 mm long.
Inflorescences typically short, 1–3.5 cm long including peduncle, fairly lax to very condensed, the rhachis pedicels and calyx tube almost glabrous to usually pubescent or densely shortly hairy; peduncle 5–10 mm long, similarly hairy, with paired bracts near the apex 3 × 2 mm long; pedicels 2–4 mm long, pubescent.
Corolla distinctly apiculate at the apex but not tailed in bud; glabrous outside, greenish-white, or green to yellow; tube 4–5 mm long with a conspicuous tuft of hairs projecting from the throat; lobes 4–4.5 ´ 2 mm.
Stems sometimes several, virgate with branching often horizontal; bark grey, brown or red-brown, more or less smooth or finely ridged; young shoots mostly dark plum-coloured and lenticellate, quite glabrous.
Calyx tube 1.5 mm in diameter, subglobose, glabrescent to densely shortly hairy; lobes (1.2)3–7 mm long, oblong to linear, sometimes slightly spathulate, glabrous or ciliolate.
Fruit turning brown, 1.7–2.2 × 1.4–2.2 cm, subglobose, or sometimes irregularly ellipsoid where only one pyrene has developed, glabrous; pyrenes 3–5, 9–17 × 4–6 mm.
Shrub, subscandent shrub or small spreading tree 1.8–15 m tall.
Pollen presenter 1.2 mm long.
Style 6–8 mm long.
