Shrubs, 20-40 cm (branches widely spreading), mildly aromatic; root-sprouting (caudices stout). Stems gray (coarse, brittle), hairy (bark gray, exfoliating). Leaves deciduous, silver-gray (rigid); blades broadly spatulate, 1.5-4 × 0.5-0.7 cm (bases narrow), 3-lobed (lobes ¹/2+ blade lengths, ca. 1 mm wide), faces densely hairy. Heads borne singly or (in glomerules) in (densely leafy) spiciform or paniculiform arrays 2-20 × 2 cm. Involucres narrowly campanulate, 4-5 × 2.5-3.5 mm. Phyllaries elliptic (acute to obtuse), densely canescent. Florets 4-8; corollas yellowish red to red, 2-2.8 mm (style branches oblong, truncate, exsert). Cypselae (4-5-ribbed) 1-1.5 mm, glabrous. 2n = 18, 36.

Flowering mid summer-early fall. Dry rocky scablands, volcanic plains; 1500-1800 m; Idaho, Mont., Oreg., Wash.

Artemisia rigida is an important successional species following fires because the plants form new shoots from the underground caudices. This characteristic aligns the species with other `sprouters´ in the subgenus, namely A. cana, A. tripartita, and A. arbuscula.