Dioecious. Plants (8-)30-65 cm (caudices branching or rhizomes stout). Stolons none. Basal leaves 3-5-nerved, spatulate to oblanceolate or lanceolate, 50-200 × 4-25 mm, tips acute, mucronate, faces gray-pubescent or silvery sericeous. Cauline leaves linear, 8-140 mm, distal flagged or not. Heads 3-30 in corymbiform to paniculiform arrays. Involucres: staminate 5-8 mm; pistillate 7-12 mm. Phyllaries distally black, dark brown, light brown, castaneous, or olivaceous. Corollas: staminate 3-5 mm; pistillate 3-6 mm. Cypselae 1-1.5 mm, glabrous; pappi: staminate 4-6 mm; pistillate (5-)8-10 mm. 2n = 28, 56.

Antennaria pulcherrima is characterized by relatively large basal leaves, rhizomatous growth, and dark-colored phyllaries, each with a relatively large black spot at the base (R. J. Bayer and G. L. Stebbins 1987).