It is an erect, slender shrub with hairy branchlets, lance-shaped, narrowly elliptic or oblong leaves, and dense panicles of golden-yellow flowers.

There are narrowly lance-shaped stipules 3–4 mm (0.12–0.16 in) long at the base of the petiole, but that fall off as the leaf matures.

[2][3][4] Pomaderris virgata was first formally described in 1988 by Neville Grant Walsh in the journal Muelleria from specimens he collected in 1986 from Nalbaugh National Park (now part of the South East Forests National Park).

[3][5] The specific epithet (virgata) refers to the slender, upright habit of this species.

[3] Upright pomaderris grows in rocky sites, often near watercourses in forest.