Shingle oak is a medium-sized tree with a straight trunk and an open, broadly rounded crown.
Leaves turn yellowish or reddish brown in autumn; dead leaves often persist on the tree through winter.
Bark is smooth, brownish-gray when young; nearly black with broad ridges and shallow fissures with age.
Flowers April–May, in catkins.
Fruits September–October; acorns solitary or in pairs; nut light to dark brown, often with pale stripes, shiny, broadest at the base and rounded at the tip, about ½ inch long; cup covering a third to half the nut, with brown, flattened, hairy scales. Seed bitter; acorns ripen in autumn of the second year.
Mature height is 80′