Small deciduous trees, rare shrubs, up to 10 m.
Branchlets are green or later turn green-brown, sometimes with thorns.
Leaves broadly ovate to cordate-ovate, with serrate edges.
Flowers are solitary or clustered with 2 ~ 3 flowers, mostly sessile or short-stalked, pale pink to white, 2 ~ 3 cm in diameter, fragrant, and open in front of leaves in winter and spring.
Drupe is nearly spherical, yellow or yellowish green.
There are many varieties of plums in China, which are divided into three types according to the growth posture of branches: straight branch type, drooping type and longyou type, and then divided into Jiang Mei type, palace pink type, jade butterfly type, cinnabar type, green calyx type, golden sprinkling type, Huang Xiang type, single pink drooping type, residual snow drooping type, Bai Bi drooping type, bone red drooping type and jade butterfly Youlong type 12.