[3] Planchonella australis grows as a tree reaching a maximum height of 30 metres (98 feet), with a fluted trunk up to 120 cm (47 in) diameter, with rough brown bark.

[5] The species ranges along the eastern coastline of Australia, from Bulburin in Queensland to the Illawarra region of New South Wales.

[3] It grows in various types of rainforest, with specimens on the red basalt soil of the MacPherson Range attaining a large size.

[3] The first European account of the tree is in Captain James Cook's logs of his 1770 exploration of the East coast of Australia.

The tree was later described as Achras australis by Robert Brown in his 1810 work Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae,[6] before being moved to its current binomial name by Jean Baptiste Louis Pierre in 1890.

[8] It belongs to the large genus Pouteria which occurs across the tropics from South America to Indonesia and into eastern Australia.