Juniperus communis, the common juniper, is a species of small tree or shrub in the cypress family Cupressaceae. An evergreen conifer, it has the largest geographical range of any woody plant, with a circumpolar distribution throughout the cool temperate Northern Hemisphere.
The fruit are berry-like cones, initially green, ripening in 18 months to purple-black with a blue waxy coating; they are spherical, 4–12 millimetres diameter, and usually have three (occasionally six) fleshy fused scales, each scale with a single seed.