Plants 10-30 cm . Stems erect to spreading, green when young, becoming reddish brown, intricately branched, glabrous or sparsely hairy, sometimes resinous. Leaves ascending to spreading; blades linear (slightly concave), usually recurved, 5-15 × 0.5-1.5 mm, midnerves evident abaxially, apices acute, usually mucronate, faces glabrous or sparsely hairy, gland-dotted (not in deep pits), ± resinous; axillary fascicles of 4-7 leaves usually present. Heads borne singly or (2-7) in cymiform arrays (clusters 3-20 mm) . Peduncles 1-10 mm (glabrous or with conic hairs, resinous). Involucres subcylindric, 10-15 × 3-7 mm. Phyllaries 18-30 in 5-7 series, tan, ovate to elliptic, 2-12 × 1-2.5 mm, unequal, mostly chartaceous, occasionally herbaceous-tipped (mid bodies apically obtuse to truncate, appendages usually herbaceous, often spreading to recurved, midnerves faint, (margins membranous, fimbriate distally, otherwise sometimes ciliolate) apices acute to cuspidate, abaxial faces mostly resinous. Ray florets 0. Disc florets 5-6; corollas 9-10.5 mm. Cypselae tan to brown, turbinate to narrowly oblanceolate, 5-7 mm (ribs 5-7), moderately hairy distally; pappi off-white to brown, 9-10.5 mm.

Flowering summer-fall. Open coniferous forest, usually on serpentine soil, Arid Transition Zone; 1500-1700 m; Calif.

Ericameria ophitidisis is known from northern California.