Tree or shrub, 2-25 m tall, with grayish-white or dark brown bark. Branchlets gray-brown or gray-brown, shoots green, glabrous or sparsely pilose. Winter buds ovate-elliptic, glabrous.

Leaf blade ovate, elliptic or oblong-ovate, apex cuspidate or shortly acuminate, base rounded or cuneate. Inflorescence umbellate, with 3-4 flowers, flowers and leaves together; pedicel 0.8-3.4 cm, sparsely pilose or glabrous; sepals triangular-ovoid or ovate-oblong, apex rounded or acute; petals white or pink, obovate. Drupe subglobose or ovoid, red to purple-black, 0.9-2.5 cm in diam. Flowering period March-May, fruiting period May-September.

Hairy cherry

Shrubs, usually 0.3-1 m tall, sparsely small tree-like, up to 2-3 m tall. Branchlets purple-brown or gray-brown, shoots densely tomentose to glabrous. Winter buds ovate, sparsely pubescent or glabrous.

Leaf blade ovate-elliptic or obovate-elliptic, 2-7 cm long, 1-3.5 cm wide, apex acute or acuminate, base cuneate, margins acute or coarsely serrate, dark green or dark green above, sparsely pilose, gray-green below, densely gray tomentose or later becoming sparsely so, lateral veins 4-7 pairs; petiole 2-8 mm long, tomentose or sparsely deciduous; stipules linear, 3-6 mm long, villous. Millimeters, villous.

Flowers solitary or in clusters of 2, coetaneous, nearly leaf-opening or leaf-opening; pedicel to 2.5 mm or nearly sessile; calyx tube tubular or cupular, 4-5 mm, pubescent or glabrous outside, sepals triangular-ovate, apex rounded or acute, 2-3 mm, pubescent or glabrous inside and outside; petals white or pink, obovate, apex rounded; 20-25 stamens, shorter than petals. Stamens 20-25, shorter than petals; style protruding nearly as long as or slightly longer than stamens; ovary entirely hairy or only apically or basally hairy.

Drupe subglobose, red, 0.5-1.2 cm in diam.; surface of drupe without ribs except longitudinal grooves on both sides of ribs. Flowering April-May, fruiting June-September.