Herbs, perennial, mat-forming, glabrous. Stems rhizomatous, procumbent or creeping, much-branched, bearing terminal rosettes. Leaves alternate, spreading, petiolate; blade green, often glaucous or pruinose, spatulate, terete to laminar, 7-19 × 4.5-10 mm, base not spurred, not scarious, apex rounded or truncate, submucronate, (surfaces papillose marginally). Flowering shoots erect, simple, 3-14 cm; leaf blades spatulate-oblong or elliptic-oblong, base not spurred; offsets not formed. Inflorescences cymes, ca. 30-flowered, ca. 3-branched; branches not recurved, forked; bracts oblong-spatulate or linear, ca. 3 cm, base not spurred. Pedicels 2-8 mm. Flowers 5-merous; sepals spreading to erect, connate basally, green or yellow-green, glaucous or pruinose, lanceolate, linear-lanceolate, oblong-ovate, or obovate, equal, ca. 2.5 × 1.5 mm, apex acute or obtuse; petals widely spreading from short, erect base, distinct or slightly connate basally, yellow, linear to oblanceolate, not carinate, 4.5-9 mm, apex acute; filaments yellow; anthers yellow; nectar scales yellow, reniform or nearly square. Carpels divergent in fruit, connate basally, brown. 2n = 30.

The mature carpels of Sedum spathulifolium have five ribs and prominent lips along the adaxial suture. The flowers are sweetly fragrant.