Plants forming open colonies, 2-5(-7.5) dm; twigs green, slightly angled, pilose or hairy. Leaves deciduous; blade green, elliptic, 23-62 × 10-36 mm, subcoriaceous, margins entire, surfaces densely hairy, eglandular abaxially. Flowers: calyx green, glandular-hairy; corolla white, cylindric, 5-9 mm, (glandular-hairy); filaments hairy. Berries black, 7-9 mm diam., hairy. Seeds 3-9, ca. 1 mm. 2n = 48.

Flowering summer. Dry oak-pine ridges and mountain meadows; 600-1500 m; Ga., N.C., Tenn.

Vaccinium hirsutum is uncommon (but not threatened) in Tennessee, rare in North Carolina, and probably extirpated in Georgia.