Herbs or subshrubs, with prostrate or erect branches, the old branches sometimes becoming spinescent. Leaves small, variable, usually with midi-fixed trichomes. Flowers 5-merous, axillary or in terminal spikes or dense few-flowered cymes. Sepals acute or obtuse, subequal. Corolla small, funnel-shaped, the lobes mostly short. Style bifid, usually to the base, stigmas more or less peltate, sometimes bilobed. Fruit capsular, 4-valved.