Sophora chrysophylla is a shrub or tree that can grow up to 15 meters tall. It is characterized by its longitudinally ridged, golden brown, strigose branches, which become glabrate with age. The leaves are odd-pinnately compound and alternate, with (1–)12–20 oblong-elliptic, oblong-obovate, or oblong-ovate leaflets, ranging from 0.7–5 cm in length and 0.3–2.3 cm in width, on a channeled rachis. Leaflets feature a rounded or obtuse apex, often slightly emarginate, with bases cuneate. Their upper surfaces may be sparsely to moderately strigose or glabrate, and the lower surfaces range from sparsely to densely strigose, with golden brown hairs that turn gray. The leaf margins are entire, and petioles are 0.6–2.7 cm long. The flowers are yellow and papilionaceous, arranged in terminal and axillary racemes, with swollen or jointed pedicels at the base and measuring 6–30 mm long. The calyx is asymmetrically hemispherical, 4–12 mm long, and moderately to densely strigose. The corolla’s standard is ovate to elliptic, measuring 11.5–21 mm by 8–20 mm, with wings and keel extending 12–28 mm and 14–25 mm long, respectively. The fruit is a moniliform pod, 2–16 cm long and 0.5–2 cm wide, including wings, and sparsely to densely strigose. It contains 1–6(–15) brown to grayish black, ellipsoid to subglobose seeds, each 6–8 mm long, with a small hilum. It is found in dry shrubland and forest to mesic or rarely wet forest environments between 450-3240 meters.