It is a shrub or tree endemic to the Marquesas Islands of French Polynesia.

[2] Pterophylla marquesana is a shrub to a small tree, rarely a subshrub, (0.6-) 1.5 – 10 meters tall, with a trunk up to 35 cm in diameter.

Flowers are greenish-white to cream, with a greenish-red calyx and white corolla and stamens.

It grows at mid- to high-elevations, typically above 500 to 600 meters elevation except on Nuku Hiva, where found from 790–1180 m.[3] It is common in mid-elevation forests, which occur between 300 and 800 meters elevation on the larger islands.

[4] On Nuku Hiva it is the co-dominant canopy tree in montane forests above 790 meters elevation.