Plants to 40 cm. Roots 1-4, 1-6 cm × 3-8 mm. Stems subterranean or nearly so, short. Leaves fugacious, present or absent at time of flowering, 2-5, delicate, glabrous; petiole erect, slender, 2-4 cm; blade spreading, elliptic, 2-4.5 × 1.3-2 cm, apex acute. Inflorescences 6-35-flowered racemes, pubescent distally; scape 10-12.5 cm × 0.6-1 mm; bracts 5-6; floral bracts ovate, 5-12 mm, apex acuminate. Flowers white with green midveins, subsalverform; sepals connate at base, 1-veined, lanceolate, margins entire, apex acute to acuminate, abaxially pubescent; dorsal sepal 4-6 × 1.5 mm; lateral sepals oblique, 4.2-6 × 1.2 mm; petals 1-veined, linear, slightly falcate, 4 × 0.6 mm, apex acute, glabrous; lip adnate to base of column foot, 3-veined, 4.5 × 1.5-2 mm, glabrous; claw 1.5 mm, auricles subulate, 0.7-0.8 mm, projecting basally, flanking column and column foot; column slender, 2.5 mm, foot extending obliquely along ovary 1.5 mm without forming mentum; pedicellate ovary 3-4 mm, sparsely pubescent. Capsules 4-6 mm.

Flowering Mar--Apr. Hammocks, in humus; 0--10 m; Fla.; Mexico; West Indies; Central America.

Beloglottis costaricensis has been questionably recorded in South America.