Plants: medium-sized to large, in thin to dense mats, light to dark green or yellowish, glossy. Stems: creeping, complanate-foliate, sometimes julaceous or subjulaceous, simple or sparingly and irregularly branched, branches not curled when dry; hyalodermis absent, central strand sometimes present; pseudoparaphyllia foliose. Stem: and branch leaves similar, erect to wide-spreading or squarrose, ovate, ovate-lanceolate, oblong-lanceolate, or oblong-ovate, widest beyond base, not or occasionally plicate; base not decurrent; margins plane or recurved, serrulate to entire proximally, serrate to serrulate distally; apex acute to subobtuse, sometimes acuminate; costa double and short or sometimes ecostate; alar cells differentiated, quadrate to rectangular; laminal cells smooth or prorulose at distal ends on abaxial surface; basal row of cells smooth; distal cells usually longer than 6:1. : Specialized asexual reproduction absent. Sexual: condition dioicous [rarely synoicous], usually sterile; perichaetial leaves ± spreading, lanceolate to ovate-lanceolate, apex slenderly acuminate. Seta: yellowish to red. Capsule: cernuous, oblong-ovoid, straight to arcuate, somewhat contracted below mouth and wrinkled at neck when dry; annulus 2-seriate, persistent; operculum obliquely rostrate; peristome double; exostome teeth cross striolate proximally, papillose distally; endostome basal membrane high to low, segments keeled, cilia shorter than or same length as segments, in groups of 1–3. Calyptra: naked. Spores: globose to ovoid, smooth to minutely papillose. North America, Mexico, West Indies, Central America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, terrestrial habitats, primarily on calcareous substrates, temperate, subtropical or tropical regions.

Species 10–15 (4 in the flora). Taxiphyllum has stems with small, thick-walled cortical cells, smooth rhizoids in clusters below the leaf insertions usually on the ventral surface of stems, and axillary hairs with one or two, rarely three short basal cells, and one elongate apical cell. The laminal cells are linear-flexuose, or rhomboidal near the apex, and the cell walls are not pitted. The inflorescences occur at the base of stems and branches; the perigonial bracts are small and ovate; the setae are flexuose; the capsules are smooth; and the exostome teeth are bordered and trabeculate.