Evergreen huckleberry is a stiffly erect, bushy shrub to 4 m tall. The leaves are alternate, evergreen, thick and leathery, sharply-toothed, dark shiny green on top, paler below, 2-5 cm long, and often somewhat 2-ranked. The flowers are pink pendent bells clustered in the axils of the leaves. The fruits are purplish-black berries, shiny, edible and sweet but musky. Evergreen huckleberry is very common in coniferous forest openings and edges at low elevations, and sometimes occurs close to tidewater along the coast.