Plant is an upright smooth perennial. Preferred habitat is savannas, ditches and wet pine woods. Distribution is coastal in the Escambia region. Leaves are opposite on the stem; no leaf stalk; becomes narrowly lance-like; no teeth and no lobes. Upper leaves are spreading and becoming more linear upward; basal leaves absent. Each pair of leaves is arranged at right angles to those above and below. The flower is at the end of the stem (terminal), or may be clustered at the leaf axil.

The calyx is lobed and the corolla is rotate (like a wheel); deeply parted into paddle-like lobes numbering nine to twelve (usually 10); rose to pink with with a yellow outline at the base of each lobe.

Flowers occur in early summer and occasionally summar and autumn.

Large Rose Gnetian differs from the related Bartram's Rose Gentian in that it does not have the distinctive red border at the apex of each lobe. Further, the leaves of this plant are lance-like to oblong from the base to apex and the flowers are not subtended by leafy bracts.

Fruit is a capsule.