Trees or shrubs evergreen, dioecious or rarely monoecious. Leaves decussate, subopposite, or spirally arranged; blade scalelike, subulate, or linear to elliptic, stomatal lines abaxial or present on all surfaces. Pollen cones terminal, solitary or clustered in leaf axils, or borne in spikelike complexes; individual cones pedunculate or sessile; microsporophylls numerous, spirally arranged, with distinct adaxial and abaxial surfaces; microsporangia 2; pollen 2(or 3)-saccate in Chinese species, (rarely nonsaccate). Seed-bearing structures terminal or axillary, solitary, occasionally spikelike, comprising few to several spirally arranged bracts; all or only apical bracts fertile, smooth or warty; basal bracts sometimes fused and succulent (together with peduncle) to form a "receptacle," or obsolete; ovule (inverted) or inclined in Chinese species. Seed drupelike or nutlike, wholly or (in Dacrydium) partly enveloped in a sometimes colored and succulent epimatium derived from fertile ovulate scale. Cotyledons 2.

Eighteen genera and ca. 180 species: tropical, subtropical, and S temperate zones, mainly in S hemisphere but extending to montane tropical Africa, Central America, and Japan; four genera and 12 species (three endemic) in China.

Although strictly a flowering plant term, "receptacle" is used widely in Podocarpaceae literature, e.g., by Tomlinson (Int. J. Plant Sci. 153: 572-588. 1992). Spjut (Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 70: 21, 71-73. 1994) incorrectly used the term "epimatium" to denote the peduncle of Nageia and also the receptacle of Podocarpus and Dacrycarpus.

Cheng Wan-chün, Fu Li-kuo & Chao Chi-son. 1978. Podocarpaceae. In: Cheng Wan-chün & Fu Li-kuo, eds., Fl. Reipubl. Popularis Sin. 7: 398-422.

(Authors: Fu Liguo (傅立国 Fu Li-kuo) , Li Yong (李勇) ; Robert R. Mill)