Stem erect, green, ca. 1.5 m tall, strong, angular, slightly branched or not, glabrous when mature. Petiole green, 1-15 cm, pilose; leaf blade green or red, rhombic-ovate or rhombic-lanceolate, 4-15 × 2-8 cm, both surfaces glabrous, base cuneate, margin entire or undulate, apex acuminate or obtuse. Complex thyrsoid structures terminal, pendulous, much branched, composed of many spikes. Bracts red, lanceolate, ca. 3 mm, transparent, with a midvein abaxially, apex apiculate. Tepals red, shorter than fruit, 2-2.5 mm, transparent, overlapping at margins, with a midvein; male segments oblong; female segments oblong-lanceolate. Stamens 5; stigmas 3, shorter than 1 mm. Utricles red above, subglobose, ca. 3 mm in diam., longer than perianth, circumscissile. Seeds light yellowish brown, subglobose. Fl. Jul-Aug, fr. Sep-Oct. 2n = 32*, 64.

Widely cultivated. in China [native to neotropics; cultivated worldwide].