These gentians flower from mid to late summer, most of them giving gentian colour after the alpine spring gentians, and before the asiatic autumn varieties. They have some upright and some trailing stems, with terminal clusters of flowers, deep blue or purplish blue in most species. Easy and very rewarding.

Gentiana septemfida is an excellent and easily grown plant for the rock garden or raised bed, giving intense blue colour for a long time in mid to late summer. It has also gone by the name Gentiana freyniana, which some still regard as a separate species.