Stems highly branched from base, 1-5 dm; branches mainly steeply ascending. Leaves: blade ovate to cordate-ovate or subcordate, 5-15(-20) × (3-)5-12 mm wide, base rounded to cordate-clasping, margin typically entire, or sparingly toothed below middle. Anthers red or purple. Fruiting bracteoles semicircular to deltoid-ovate in profile, 4-5 mm and about as wide, central tooth largest, scarcely though sometimes tuberculate on faces. 2n = 36.

Flowering spring-fall. Hard trampled, somewhat saline or alkaline soils; of conservation concern; below 70 m; Calif.

Atriplex cordulata var. cordulata often occurs with Distichlis spicata, Centromadia pungens, Suaeda moquinii, Spergularia macrotheca, Frankenia salina, Sporobolus airoides, and other annual Atriplex species.