Plants shrubs, subshrubs, or hebs, up to 1.5 m tall. Stems glabrous or pubescent; hairs unicellular, with 2-3 rays. Leaves sessile or petiolate, stipulate, opposite but sometimes on short shoots and appearing alternate; stipules more or less fused, herbaceous or membranous; blades with 1 or 2 leaflets; leaflets flat or terete, orbicular, ovate, obovate, oblong, or linear, sometimes with a soft mucro, rachises herbaceous. Sepals usually 5, rarely 4, herbaceous or succulent, glabrous or pubescent, sometimes with membranous margins, tips acute-attenutate or rounded-obtuse; petals 5, rarely 4, more or less obovate, white yellow or pale orange, more or less conivent, rarely spreading; stamens 10, filaments with undivided or split basal appendages; nectary discs smooth; ovaries united, 3-5-locular, glabrous or hairy. Fruits usually schizocarps, obovate, orbicular, ovate to more or less oblong in outline; mericarps opening septicially or indehiscent, rarely locules almost free, endocarp and exocarp sometimes extending as wings; seeds with mucilaginous outer testa.
Tetraena is a genus of about 40 species with a distribution stretching from the Canary Island and South Africa to China. It used to be included in Zygophyllum.