It consists of shrubs that have perennial aerial woody stems.

Other peonies do not have perennial woody stems, but their stems die back after the growing season, to emerge again from buds just below the surface early in the following year.

They are used in China both for medicine and as an ornamental, particularly the hybrids called Paeonia suffruticosa.

These hybrids in particular, but other tree peonies too, are called mǔdān (牡丹) in China.

Two subsections are recognised within the section Moutan: Delavayana and Vaginatae.