Nothocestrum breviflorum is a stout tree reaching 10–12 meters in height, with a trunk up to 45 cm in diameter. The wood is whitish green, soft, and sappy, while the bark is brown or gray and smooth. Branches are stiff and ascend from the main trunk. The leaves are simple and alternate, often clustered toward the tips of branches. The blades are oblong to elliptic–oblong, measuring 5–12 cm long and 3–6 cm wide, with apex and base either acute or obtuse. The upper surfaces are glabrous to sparsely covered with whitish hairs, while the lower surfaces are sparsely to densely whitish pubescent. Leaves are relatively thick and chartaceous, and seasonally deciduous. Margins are entire, petioles are 2–5 cm long, and stipules are absent. The flowers are numerous, arranged on short axillary spurs with pedicels 4–10 mm long. The flowers are bisexual (perfect), radially symmetrical, and pedicellate. The calyx is 4-lobed and 6–11 mm long, with dentate margins. The greenish-yellow corolla is also 4-lobed, with a short tube that barely extends beyond the calyx; lobes are pubescent externally and glabrous internally. There are four stamens with very short to absent filaments and linear, acute anthers that open by longitudinal slits. The ovary is superior, 2-celled, and ovoid with numerous ovules. The style is short, ending in a 2-lobed stigma. The fruits are orangish-red, fleshy berries, depressed, globose to oblong in shape, 6–8 mm long, and enclosed by the persistent calyx. Seeds are irregular in shape with a pitted seed coat, a curved embryo, and present endosperm. It occurs in dry to occasionally mesic forest habitats between 550-1,830 meters.