The flowers are borne in catkins 3–18 mm long, in range of colors from green to red.

The fruit is a wrinkled berry 3–5.5 mm diameter, with a pale blue-purple waxy coating; they are an important food for yellow-rumped warblers.

This species has root nodules containing nitrogen-fixing microorganisms, allowing it to grow in relatively poor soils.

This plant is one of several Myrica species that are sometimes split into the genus Morella, e.g. in the Integrated Taxonomic Information System.

American colonists boiled the berries to extract the sweet-smelling wax, which they used to make clean-burning candles.