Engelmann Spruce is a medium to large evergreen tree, populating mountains or water's edge of Interior BC to Western Alberta and southward. It prefers in rich, moist soil and often grows alongside lodgepole pine, birch, aspen, subalpine fir, western larch, and western hemlock.

The crown is tall and slender with a pointed tip and branches often drooping near that bottom. The needles are flexible, bluish-green, and forward-pointing, with stripes of white dots appearing on all sides. Cones are ragged-tipped unlike its close relative the white spruce (which it interbreeds with).