Plants perennial; rhizomatous, rhizomes, short, sometimes knotty. Culms 30-90 cm; nodes glabrous, strigose, or with appressed hairs. Sheaths with papillose-based hairs, sometimes nearly glabrous, margins ciliate distally; ligules 1-2 mm, of stiff hairs; blades 4-30 cm long, 1-7 mm wide, involute, stiff, scabridulous and narrowed basally. Panicles 5-20 cm, erect, slender, interrupted; rachises scabrous; bristles 2-8 mm. Spikelets 2.1-4.5 mm, elliptic to obovate, randomly distributed on the branch axes. Lower glumes 1/2 as long as the spikelets, 5-7-veined; upper glumes equaling the upper lemmas, 7-9-veined; lower lemmas equaling the upper lemmas; lower paleas absent; upper lemmas indurate, finely and transversely rugose; upper paleas similar to the upper lemmas.

Setaria reverchonii grows in sandy prairies and limestone hills from eastern New Mexico, southwestern Oklahoma, and Texas to northern Mexico.