The tree varies from 18 to 21 meters (60–70 feet) high with a spread of 12–15 meters (40–50 feet) and a trunk up to one meter (3 feet) in diameter. The tree grows at a medium rate with height increases of anywhere from 12" to 24" per year. A 10-year-old sapling will stand about 4 meters (13 feet) tall. It usually separates 3 to 4½ meters (10–15 feet) from the ground into three or four divisions which spread slightly and form a narrow pyramidal head; or when crowded by other trees, sending up one tall central branchless shaft to the height of 15–21 m (50–70 ft). Branches are stout, pithy, and blunt; roots are fibrous.

The Kentucky coffeetree is a moderately fast-growing tree, and male trees are often grown in parks and along city streets for ornamental purposes. The tree is typically fairly short-lived, healthy trees living from 100 to 150 years. The Kentucky coffeetree sheds its leaves early during the fall and appears bare for up to 6 months. The naked appearance of the tree is reflected through the Kentucky coffeetree's Greek genus name, which means "naked branch". Like the Sumac, branches are absent of fine spray; smaller branches are thick and lumpish. Because of the absence of smaller branches and its later leafing, the French in Canada named it Chicot, "stubby". The expanding leaves are conspicuous because of the varied colors of the leaflets; the youngest are bright pink, while those which are older vary from green to bronze.

The bark is ash-gray and scaly, flaking similarly to black cherry, but more so. The trees are dioecious, and the fruit is a hard-shelled bean in heavy, woody, thick-walled pods filled with sweet, thick, gooey pulp. Pod length ranges from 5 to 10 inches (130 to 250 mm); unfertilized female trees may bear miniature seedless pods. The beans are commonly thought to contain the toxin cytisine, although this has yet to be confirmed in a study.

• Bark: Tan or dark gray, deeply fissured, surface scaly, often with prominent narrow ridges. Branchlets at first coated with short reddish down.
• Wood: Light brown; heavy, strong, coarse-grained; durable in contact with the ground, takes a fine polish. Specific gravity, 0.6934; weight of cubic foot, 43.21 lb (19.60 kg).
• Winter buds: Minute, depressed in downy cavities of the stem, two in the axil of each leaf, the smaller sterile. Bud scales two, ovate, coated with brown tomentum and growing with the shoot, become orange green, hairy and about one inch long, before they fall.
• Leaves: Alternate, bipinnately compound, ten to fourteen pinnate, lowest pinnae reduced to leaflets, the other seven to thirteen foliate. One to three feet long, eighteen to twenty-four inches broad, by the greater development of the upper pairs of pinnae. Leaf stalks and stalks of pinnae, are terete, enlarged at base, smooth when mature, pale green, often purple on the upper side. Leaflets ovate, two to two and one-half inches long, wedge-shaped or irregularly rounded at base, with wavy margin, acute apex. They come out of the bud bright pink, but soon become bronze green, smooth and shining above. When full grown are dark yellow green above, pale green beneath. In autumn turn a bright clear yellow. Stipules leaf-like, lanceolate, serrate, deciduous.
• Winter twigs are very stout and dark reddish brown to green brown in color; the pith is very thick and salmon pink to brown in color. The terminal bud is absent, and the lateral buds are small, bronze in color, and appear to be partially sunken beneath the bark of the twig. The leaf scars are very large, heart shaped with 3 to 5 conspicuous bundle scars. The flowers are dioecious (male and female flowers on separate plants). The female flowers are 8 to 12 inches long, greenish white in color, appear in early summer, and are quite fragrant. The male flowers are about half the size of the female flowers.
• Flowers: June. Dioecious by abortion, terminal, greenish white. Staminate flowers in a short raceme-like corymb three to four inches (75–100 mm) long, pistillate flowers in a raceme ten to twelve inches (250–300 mm) long.
• Calyx: Tubular, hairy, ten-ribbed, five-lobed; lobes valvate in bud, acute, nearly equal.
• Corolla: Petals five, oblong, hairy, spreading or reflexed, imbricate in bud.
• Stamens: Ten, five long and five short, free, included; filaments thread-like; anthers orange colored, introrse; in the pistillate flower small and sterile.
• Pistil: Ovary superior, sessile, hairy, contracted into a short style, with two stigmatic lobes; ovules in two rows.
• Fruit: Legume, six to ten inches (150–250 mm) long, one and one-half to two inches wide, somewhat curved, with thickened margins, dark reddish brown with slight glaucous bloom, crowned with remnant of the styles. Stalks an inch or two long. Seeds six to nine, surrounded by a thick layer of dark, sweet pulp.
• Rooting Habit, "Tap Root in proportion like a carrot". A seedling tree grows many times in root length to its growth upward in height. The Kentucky coffee tree is not commonly offered in the nursery trade because the taproot makes the tree somewhat difficult to transplant. Being in the Legume family the roots fix nitrogen in the soil.
• Soil: Prefers rich, moist soils in floodplains, terraces, ravines, coves, and lower slopes.