Annual to c. 1 m high, erect, branched, often red-tinged, with stout ribbed hairy stems, sometimes slender if in impoverished dry soil. Petioles of lower lvs to 10 cm long, hairy or glabrous. Lamina 6-15 × 2-7.5 cm (smaller lvs subtending infl.), ovate, lanceolate-ovate to elliptic-ovate, becoming glabrous apart from puberulent nerves below; base cuneate; apex obtuse or acute. Panicle crimson-red or green, much-branched; main axis erect, to c. 20 cm high; branches spreading, further divided or not. Spikes densely arranged, c. 5 mm wide, short or slender and up to 5-(10) cm long. Bracteoles 2-4 mm long, ovate with subulate tip; keel greenish or red. Perianth 5-merous. Tepals 5, unequal, mostly 1-2 mm long (the longest c. 3 mm long), elliptic-oblong, acute or shortly acuminate, green or reddish with darker keel; tepals of ♂ fls slightly > ♀ at anthesis. Stigmas 3-(4), usually > tepals. Fr. = or > perianth, circumscissile, obovoid, with very short neck. Seed 1-1.2-(5) mm diam., ± orbicular, shining dark brown or black; margin keeled.