It is a shrub or small tree with lance-shaped to egg-shaped leaves, creamy green flowers, and elliptic black drupes.

Cryptocarya rigida is a shrub or small tree that typically grows to a height of 10 m (33 ft) with a dbh of about 20 cm (7.9 in) and has grey, thin corky bark, it stems not buttressed.

[2][3][4] Cryptocarya rigida was first formally described in 1864 by Carl Meissner in de Candolle's Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis from specimens collected near the Clarence River by Ferdinand von Mueller.

[2] The species is extinct in the Illawarra region (34° S), allegedly seen there in 1818 by Allan Cunningham.Bofeldt, Anders (2011).

Like most Australian species of Cryptocarya, removal of the fleshy aril is advised to assist seed germination, which is slow but reliable with C. rigida.