The fronds of Phegopteris hexagonoptera are 25-75 cm long and spread out on elongate rhizomes (therefore not strongly clumped). Blades are up to 33 cm long and approximately the same width and are most often 2-pinnatifid, all the pinnae connected along the rachis by a narrow wing of blade tissue. The lowest pair of pinnae are often narrowed at the base and they tend to be spreading rather than conspicuously reflexed as in the similar P. connectilis.

P. hexagonoptera ranges from Quebec to Florida, west to Texas and Wisconsin. It is uncommon to rare in Wisconsin at scattered localities, absent from the northwest and the northeast and it is listed as a "special concern" species. Habitat is usually in moist woods, often on acidic soils.