Shrubs to tall trees , evergreen or rarely deciduous ( Cassytha a parasitic vine with leaves reduced to scales), usually aromatic. Leaves alternate, rarely whorled or opposite, simple, without stipules, petiolate. Leaf blade: unlobed (unlobed or lobed in Sassafras ), margins entire, occasionally with domatia (crevices or hollows serving as lodging for mites) in axils of main lateral veins (in Cinnamomum ). Inflorescences in axils of leaves or deciduous bracts, panicles (rarely heads), racemes, compound cymes, or pseudoumbels (spikes in Cassytha ), sometimes enclosed by decussate bracts. Flowers bisexual or unisexual, bisexual only, or staminate and pistillate on different plants, or staminate and bisexual on some plants, pistillate and bisexual on others; flowers usually yellow to greenish or white, rarely reddish; hypanthium well developed, resembling calyx tube, tepals and stamens perigynous; tepals 6(-9), in 2(-3) whorls of 3, sepaloid, equal or rarely unequal, if unequal then usually outer 3 smaller than inner 3 (occasionally absent in Litsea ); stamens (3-)9(-12), in whorls of 3, but 1 or more whorls frequently staminodial or absent; stamens of 3d whorl with 2 glands near base; anthers 2- or 4-locular, locules opening by valves; pistil 1, 1-carpellate; ovary 1-locular; placentation basal; ovule 1; stigma subsessile, discoid or capitate. Fruits drupes, drupe borne on pedicel with or without persistent tepals at base, or seated in ± deeply cup-shaped receptacle (cupule), or enclosed in accrescent floral tube. Seed 1; endosperm absent.

Cassytha is sometimes placed in its own family, Cassythaceae; it is here retained in Lauraceae.