Trees deciduous, to 50 m tall; pneumatophores present or absent around trunk; trunk swollen and buttressed at base, strongly tapered upward, to 2 m d.b.h.; bark brown, reddish brown, or gray, peeling off in long strips; crown conical, finally broadly conical, or relatively narrow and pyramidal; main branches spreading horizontally or ascending; lateral branchlets 2-ranked, axis green in 1st year, turning brown or brownish red in 1st winter. Leaves 2-ranked on annual branchlets or not, light green adaxially, yellowish green or grayish green abaxially, turning dark reddish brown in autumn, linear and flat or subulate, 4-15 × ca. 1 mm, midvein depressed adaxially, raised abaxially, stomatal lines 4-8, apex acute or sharply pointed. Pollen cones borne in terminal, crowded, short, dense racemes or panicles 5-12 cm, shortly pedunculate, ovoid. Seed cones brownish yellow or white powdery, not glaucous, globose, oblong-globose, or ovoid, (1.4-)2-4 × (1.3-)1.8-3 cm; cone scales shield-shaped, woody, ± conspicuously longitudinally grooved at apex. Seeds brown or reddish brown, irregularly triangular-pyramidal, 1.2-2.6 × 0.5-2.3 cm, sharply ridged. Pollination Mar-Apr, seed maturity (Jul-)Oct.

The wood is used in buildings, ship construction, furniture manufacture, etc.

Used for afforestation on marshy soils, and cultivated as an ornamental. Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Henan, Hubei, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Yunnan, Zhejiang [native to SE United States]