[4] It grows in the Mojave's plains and mountain ridges up to 1,700 metres (5,600 ft) in elevation.

[1][5] Ambrosia eriocentra is a rounded shrub reaching over 1.5 metres (4.9 ft) in height.

The stems are brownish gray in color, with young twigs coated in light woolly fibers and older branches bare.

Leaves are lance-shaped and up to 9 centimeters long, not counting the winged petioles.

[1] The fruit is a green burr with long, silky white hairs and several hair-tufted sharp spines.