Plants trees, up to 8 m tall, trunk bases swollen and often disk-shaped; bark pale yellowish-brown with outer flaking papery layers and a thick brown inner layer; resin copious, milky when fresh, drying yellowish; twigs stout. Leaves petiolate, 10-30 cm long (including petiole) mostly glabrous but rachises usually with minute non-glandular hairs and and longer glandular hairs; petioles 1-5 cm long; blades oblanceolate in outline, usually with 9-15 leaflets, occasionally simple; leaflets usually ovate-circular, sometimes elliptic oblong, usually up to 5 cm long and 3 cm wide, rarely larger, lower surfaces with slightly prominent prominent veins, bases truncate to cordate, margins undulate, entire, sinuate, or with some irregular crenations on each side, tips obtuse. Inflorescences in dense raceme-like thyrses on 10-30 cm long; peduncles about 1/2 as long as the inflorescences; lateral branchlets rarely more than 5 mm long; bracts 1.5- 6 mm long, ot the lower sometimes leaflike; pedicels 1-3(-4) mm long. Flowers: calyces about 2 mm long, glabrous or hairy; petals reddish or greenish red, 3.5-5 mm long, 1.5-2.5 wide; filaments glabrous, about 1.5 mm long, linear but bases widened; discs saucer-shaped, yellowish, greenish, or purplish. Fruits (5-)6(-8)-celled, 5.5-9 mm long, 3-7 mm wide, pear-shaped, glabrous; seeds trigonous, narrowing at both ends, sometimes shouldered in the upper part, often slightly winged.
Boswellia freriana grows on rocky slopes and in gullies, often on limestone boulders and cliffs, even clinging to vertical rock faces, at 5-750 (1000) m. It was known only from regions N2 and N3 of the Flora of Somalia. The resin is used as frankincense, in traditional medicine, and chewed. It is a major export commodity.