Deciduous trees, up to 20 m high, bole fluted; bark 10-12 mm thick, surface grey, smooth, brittle; blaze reddish-brown. Leaves paripinnate, alternate, exstipulate; rachis 5.5-11.5 cm, stout, glabrous, swollen at base; leaflets 4-6, opposite or subopposite; petiolule up to 3 mm, slender, glabrous; lamina 5-15 x 1.8-4.5 cm, elliptic-oblong, ovate or obovate, base oblique or rarely obtuse, apex acute or obtuse, margin entire, coriaceous, glabrous; lateral nerves 10-23, parallel, prominent, intercostal reticulate, faint. 

Flowers polygamodioecious, 5-6 mm across, greenish-yellow, in axillary spicate panicles; male flowers: calyx lobes 5, valvate or obscurely imbricate; petals 0; disc complete, with the disc; stamens 7 or 8, free, inserted within the disc; filaments 1.5 mm, pilose; anthers oblong; pistillode small; bisexual flowers: ovary 2 mm, superior, 3-celled, ovule 1 in each cell; style rigid, terete; stigma 2 or 3 lobed. 

Fruit a drupe, 16-18 mm across, subcrustaceous, pointed, often echinate with stout rather blunt prickles; seed 1 or 2, enclosed in a pulpy aril which has a pleasant acid taste; testa smooth, brown.