A moderate-sized to large evergreen tree, up to 24 meter in height and 7 meter in girth.
Bark: horizontally and longitudinally fissured, dark-grey or brownish.
Leaves: alternate, paripinnate, up to 15cm long, leaflets generally 10-20 pairs, sub-sessile, oblong.
Flowers: borne in lax few-flowered racemes at end of branchlets, small, yellow with pinkish stripes.
Pods: flat, obovate, dehiscent, scurfy, brown ash-colored.
Seeds: 3-12, obovate-oblong, compressed, with a shallow oblong pit on each side of the flat faces, smooth, dark brown.
The result of the experiment revealed that soaking of Tamarindus indica seeds in hot water at 100°C for 30minutes had a percentage germination of 20% at the period of eleven (11) days after sowing.
A similar result was obtained by Muhammad and Amusa (2003). At fifteen (15) days after sowing, the germination percentage was 80%.