A solitary disc coral, C. cyclolites is round or slightly oval, forming a dome up to 4 cm (1.6 in) wide with a hollowed out under surface.

Its range extends from Madagascar, the East African coast and the Red Sea through India and Malaysia to northern Australia, Japan and various island groups in the Pacific Ocean.

[2] This is a zooxanthellate species of coral, meaning that the soft tissues contain symbiotic unicellular dinoflagellates which provide nutrients to their host.

The coral is highly adapted to life on sand or mud in calm waters and is capable of shedding any sediment that threatens to blanket it.

The polyp can enlarge by 300 or 400% and this reduces the density of the whole animal, allowing it to "float" to the surface of the sediment in which it has become buried.