Plants 50-100 cm tall. Rhizome erect, short, with brown scales. Fronds caespitose; stipe stramineous, ca. 30 cm, ca. 2 mm in diam., clothed with lanceolate, entire, dark brown scales at base, gradually glabrous toward rachis; lamina ovate-oblong, ca. 30 × 13 cm, bipinnate-pinnatifid; pinnae ca. 13 pairs, subopposite, 3-4 cm apart, deltoid-lanceolate, shortly stalked, lower pinnae 7-9 × 2.5-3 cm, base cuneate, apex acuminate; pinnules 11-13 pairs, oblong, basal pair largest, up to ca. 2 cm × 7 mm, apex rounded, with sparse coarse teeth, tapered farther up. Lamina papery, both surfaces glabrous or with 1 or 2 small scales on costa abaxially; veins pinnate, 6 or 7 pairs on each pinnule, forked. Sori 5 or 6(-8) pairs on each pinnule; indusia brown, orbicular-reniform, papery, entire, readily deciduous.

Dryopteris juxtaposita is often misidentified as D. odontoloma (T. Moore) C. Christensen, which occurs in S India.

Valleys, riversides; 1500-2500 m. Gansu (Wenxian), Guizhou, Sichuan, Xizang, Yunnan [Bhutan, India, Kashmir, Nepal].