It is typically found growing in dry, well drained sandy upland ridges and sloped woodlands from southern Ontario, Canada, and in the United States east to New Hampshire, south to northern Florida west to eastern Texas and north-west to Nebraska.

[4] The single trunk is straight and often continues for the entire height of the tree, although sometimes splits into several large limbs once the canopy has been breached.

The largest known red hickory, located in Clay County, Kentucky, is 175 feet tall and 56 inches in diameter at breast height.

[6] The bark of mature trees is grey, composed of tight, flat-topped intersecting ridges that can appear quite blocky but are generally strap-like.

Occasionally, the ridges may separate from the trunk in peeling strips, loose at both ends, a trait characteristic of shagbark and shellbark hickories.

[citation needed] Like all hickories, the fruit is a small round or slightly elliptical nut, born singly or in groups of two or three on the ends of bearing branches.