Cryptandra pungens is a species of flowering plant in the family Rhamnaceae and is endemic to the southwest of Western Australia.

It is an erect, slender, spiny shrub that typically grows to a height of 0.2–1 m (7.9 in – 3 ft 3.4 in) with many short branches ending with thin spines.

The flowers are white, each on a pedicel 1–2 mm (0.039–0.079 in) long with minute, overlapping brown bracts at the base.

[2][3] The species was first formally described in 1845 by Ernst Gottlieb von Steudel in Lehmann's Plantae Preissianae from specimens collected in sandy forest near Perth.

[6] Cryptandra pungens grows on coastal limestone, granite outcrops, sandplains and hills in the Avon Wheatbelt, Coolgardie, Esperance Plains, Geraldton Sandplains, Jarrah Forest, Mallee and Swan Coastal Plain bioregions of south-western Western Australia.