Plants 10-40 cm. Stems erect to spreading, abundantly branched, twigs green when young, concealed by whitish, pannose tomentum, sporadically stipitate-glandular. Leaves ascending to spreading; blades linear or oblong to oblanceolate (flat), 10-35 × 2-7 mm, midnerves evident (1-2 fainter, collateral nerves often present), (margins often undulate) apices acute to obtuse, usually apiculate, faces usually stipitate-glandular, resinous; axillary fascicles absent. Heads borne singly or in cymiform to racemiform arrays. Peduncles 3-15 mm (bracts 0-3, reduced, leaflike, whitish tomentose and usually stipitate-glandular). Involucres obconic, 9-13 × 6-10 mm. Phyllaries 12-17 in 2-3 series, green to tan, lanceolate to oblong, 6-10 × 1-2 mm, subequal, outer herbaceous or distally so, inner mostly chartaceous, midnerves evident, (margins of outer often distally stipitate-glandular, of inner narrowly membranous, sometimes minutely ciliolate) apices acute to attenuate, abaxial faces stipitate-glandular. Ray florets 0. Disc florets 10-26; corollas 9-11 mm. Cypselae brownish, narrowly oblong to narrowly ovoid, 5-6 mm, villous; pappi tan, 8.5-11 mm. 2n = 18.

Flowering late summer-fall. Rocky, open or sparsely wooded slopes, often in coarse talus; 2500-3800 m; Calif., Colo., Idaho, Mont., Nev., Oreg., Utah.

Ericameria discoidea is common in the Rocky Mountains.