Trees to 70m; trunk to 2.5m diam., straight; crown narrowly conic, becoming broad and flattened. Bark gray, distinctly platy, plates scaly. Branches nearly whorled, spreading-ascending; twigs slender, pale red-brown, rusty puberulent and slightly glandular (rarely glabrous), aging purple-brown or gray, smooth. Buds ellipsoid or cylindric, rust-colored, 0.4--0.5cm, slightly resinous. Leaves 5 per fascicle, spreading to ascending, persisting 3--4 years, 4--10cm ´ 0.7--1mm, straight, slightly twisted, pliant, blue-green, abaxial surface without evident stomatal lines, adaxial surfaces with evident stomatal lines, margins finely serrulate, apex broadly to narrowly acute; sheath 1--1.5cm, shed early. Pollen cones ellipsoid, 10--15mm, yellow. Seed cones maturing in 2 years, shedding seeds and falling soon thereafter, clustered, pendent, symmetric, lance-cylindric to ellipsoid-cylindric before opening, broadly lanceoloid to ellipsoid-cylindric when open, 10--25cm, creamy brown to yellowish, without purple or gray tints, resinous, stalks to 2cm; umbo terminal, depressed. Seeds compressed, broadly obovoid-deltoid; body 5--7mm, red-brown; wing 2--2.5cm. 2 n =24.

Montane moist forests, lowland fog forests; 0--3000m; Alta., B.C.; Calif., Idaho, Mont., Nev., Oreg., Wash.

Pinus monticola is the most important western source for matchwood. Its wood lacks the sugary exudates seen in P . lambertiana .

Western white pine ( Pinus monticola ) is the state tree of Idaho.