Annual or perennial herbs or subshrubs. Stems not winged, without resin canals. Leaves alternate, usually sessile or rarely petiolate. Capitula heterogamous radiate or disciform, or homogamous discoid, in corymbiform or racemiform arrays. Involucres hemispheric to campanulate, [3-]5-10[-20+] mm in diam.; phyllaries persistent (sometimes reflexed in fruit), in (2 or)3 or 4+ series, unequal to subequal. Receptacles flat, smooth or minutely alveolate, epaleate. Ray florets when present female, fertile; corollas yellow, laminae 1.5-2+ mm. Disk florets bisexual; corollas yellow, lobes 5. Anthers ecalcarate, with branched tails; endothecial tissue radial. Pollen spines with a cavity. Style branches with acute sweeping hairs, not reaching furcation. Achenes ellipsoid, shorter than corolla and often apically contracted and glandular, hairy, with elongated crystals. Pappus of barbellate, capillary to ± flattened bristles in 1 row with an outer cup of free or connate scales. x = 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.

About 77 species: Africa, Asia, Europe; six species (one endemic, one introduced) in China.