It was one of the many species authored by the Scottish botanist Robert Brown.

[1] It grows a trunk up to 2 metres (7 ft) tall.

The leaves are dull green to blue-grey, 5 to 8 mm wide.

It flowers from January to April, depending on fire.

[2][3] Xanthorrhoea arborea grows in dry sclerophyll forests around the Sydney Basin on the New South Wales Central Coast westwards over the Great Divide to Rylstone.