Woody climbers, producing white latex. Branches lenticellate, glabrous or puberulent, bearing tendrils formed from modified inflorescences. Leaves opposite, those of a pair equal, entire, petiolate; colleters absent from leaf axils; blade papery to coriaceous. Inflorescence of axillary and, rarely, terminal cymes, often very short, appearing fasciculate; axes puberulent or glabrous; bracts small, ovate or oblong. Flowers 5-merous, actinomorphic. Sepals connate at the base; lobes free and erect or slightly reflexed; colleters absent. Corolla: lobes in bud sinistrorse forming a cone or cylinder of erect lobes; tube cylindrical, somewhat inflated around the stamens, or short and inflated; lobes spreading and ovate, elliptic or oblong. Stamen insertion variable, completely included within the tube, free from the style head; anthers ovate to narrowly ovate, apex acute or obtuse, base rounded. Disk absent. Gynoecium unilocular, with 2 parietal placentas, glabrous, superior to semi-inferior; style columnar; style head ellipsoid or cylindrical with a narrow apex, apex as long as or longer than the style head. Fruit brown or yellowish, a fleshy berry, spherical, ellipsoid or pear-shaped, indehiscent; few-to many-seeded. Seeds compressed ovoid, without a coma, smooth, with a very thin endosperm and thick horny cotyledons.
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