Usnea scabrida is a foliose lichen that grows from holdfasts on trees.

[3] It is a very pale grayish-yellowish green, slender, pendant, branching from the base, unequally branching, and shrubby.

[3] The cortex contains usnic acid, and the medulla contains scabrosins.

[4] The lichen was described as a new species in 1844 by English botanist Thomas Taylor.

[6] A subspecies Usnea scabrida subsp.