Reaching 30 m (100 ft) high, it is a large tree with fibrous bark and cream-white flowers that appear over the Austral summer.

[2] Like all members of the genus Angophora, the dull to glossy green leaves are arranged oppositely along the stem.

[5] The rough-barked apple was described by James Edward Smith in 1797 as Metrosideros floribunda, having been collected by Surgeon-General of New South Wales, John White in 1794.

[10] The Charmhaven apple (Angophora inopina) from the vicinity of Wyee on the Central Coast of New South Wales is closely related and may be a dwarf form of A.

In wetter forest, it grows alongside Sydney blue gum (E. saligna) and in closed forest alongside lillypilly (Syzygium smithii), cheese tree (Glochidion ferdinandi), Australian white birch (Schizomeria ovata) and sandpaper fig (Ficus coronata) and under emergent specimens of bangalay (E. botryoides), grey ironbark (E. paniculata) and turpentine (Syncarpia glomulifera).

[11] The longhorn beetle species Paroplites australis and Agrianome spinicollis have been recorded from the rough-barked apple.

[12] Angophora floribunda has been recorded as a host for several mistletoe species: Amyema bifurcata, A. miquelii, A. pendula, Dendrophthoe curvata, D. glabrescens, D. vitellina, Muellerina celastroides and M.