Annual to perennial herbs with suberect, simple or branched, glabrous, slender, occasionally prostrate stems. Leaves rosulate, linear to linear-lanceolate, entire to toothed, acute or obtuse. Capitula usually 15-25-flowered,  borne in  subcorymbose synflorescence. Involucre small, cylindrical to narrowly campanulate.  Phyllaries multiseriate, glabrous,  outer ones very small, c. one fourth to half as long as linear-lanceolate to lanceolate,  inner 8, membranous-margined phyllaries. Receptacle convex, rather globose, naked. Florets with   yellow, rarely whitish or purplish ligules. Cypselas brown, not or inconspicuously dorsally compressed, with 5 princiapal ribs and 5 secondary ribs, all ribs equally thick, prominently  wing-shaped, beaked.  Pappus of simple white, bristles, falling without disc.

A genus of  c. 20 species (Mabberley, 2008), distributed in Asia, mainly from NW Himalayan region to SE and Far East Asia. A few occur in S. Asia. Three species occur  in  Pakistan.

Note: The genus is closely related to Ixeridium (A. Gray) Tzvelev, Capidiastrum Nakai and Youngia Cass. It, however, differs from Youngia by having beaked cypselas, while cypselas are beakless in Youngia. From Capidiastrum it differs by having persistent pappus, whereas Capidiastrum has cypselas with caducous pappus. From Ixeridium it differs by having nonrhizomatous annual plants, short toothed ligules, 2 – 3.5  mm long cypselas with deep furrows looking like more or less wings. While Ixeridium is characterized by having rhizomatous, perennial plants, longer toothed ligules, 3.5-7 mm long cypselas with ribs not looking wing like.