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This is a tall-growing wildflower with a rather lanky appearance. A cultivar of this species, called 'Golden Glow' has double flowerheads with more ray florets (greater than 12) than the wild form. Cutleaf Coneflower is one of several Rudbeckia spp. with yellow flowerheads. It has larger and more widely separated disk florets than these other species, which provides the mature central cone of its flowerheads with a slight pincushion appearance. The central cones of Cutleaf Coneflower are light green to yellow (depending on their maturity), while the central cones of other Rudbeckia spp. are dark brown to black (e.g., Rudbeckia hirta, Rudbeckia triloba, & Rudbeckia fulgida) or grey to brown (e.g., Rudbeckia pinnata). The leaves of Cutleaf Coneflower have 3-7 deep lobes, while the leaves of other Rudbeckia spp. have fewer lobes or none. An exception is Rudbeckia pinnata (Yellow Coneflower), which has leaves with as many lobes. However, the lobes on its leaves are more narrow than those of Cutleaf Coneflower.