Saxifraga tricuspidata is a perennial herb, with evergreen leaves that grows in warm, dry disturbed sites on slopes and gravel bars in Denali, most frequently seen in mountains. Plants grow 4-10 cm tall from a creeping caudex, often richly branched and making up a dense cushion. The stems are covered by a rosette of leathery brown-green leaves and reddish persistent dead leaves beneath the live ones. The leaves are elongate with 3 sharp teeth at the tip, giving it the specific name 'tricuspidata'. The unbranched inflorescence bears a few small, opposite leaves along the stem and an open 3-10 flowered cyme at the apex. The flowers are small, with five ovate yellow or white petals, which often have yellow spots at the base and orange spots at the tip. Flowers are perfect, containing 10 stamens and two fused carpels. The fruit is a two-beaked capsule. Saxifraga tricuspidata can be distinguished from the similar Saxifraga bronchialis by the toothed leaves.

Saxifraga tricuspidata is perennial with evergreen leaves that turn red in the falls but green up in the spring. It typically flowers in early to mid-summer.

Saxifraga tricuspidata is monoecious with bisexual flowers. The genus Saxifraga is insect-pollinated, and the fruits are dry capsules which split to release many small seeds, dispersed by gravity, water and wind.

This species occurs on rocky, sandy soils in the alpine.

Dry sites.