It is a tree or shrub usually with pinnatipartite leaves and red and yellow flowers arranged on a branched, downcurved raceme.

Flowering occurs from April to September and the fruit is a thick-walled, glabrous, elliptic to more or less spherical follicle 18–31 mm (0.71–1.22 in) long.

[2][3][4] Grevillea refracta was first formally described in 1810 by the botanist Robert Brown in Transactions of the Linnean Society of London.

[4] In 1994, Peter Olde and Neil Marriott described two subspecies of G. refracta and the names are accepted by the Australian Plant Census: Subspecies glandulifera grows in woodland and savanna and is found in the Ord River catchment in Western Australia, extending just into the far west of the Northern Territory.

[8][9] Subspecies refracta grows in woodland, savanna and Triodia communities and is widespread in Western Australia, the Northern Territory and north-western Queensland, including on nearby islands, north of about latitude 21°S.