The long, slender leaves of Aloe africana spread and recurve in the large single rosette. The leaf colour is dull to greyish green, sometimes properly glaucous or blue-green.
Hard and sharp, reddish brown teeth are spaced evenly along the margins, but larger and more spaced nearer the leaf tips. The blades are often without spines, although a few sparsely scattered spines may be present on both leaf surfaces or some concentrated in a short keel row below the leaf tip.
The leaf margins curve up, rendering the upper leaf surface channelled. On plants a bit taller than this one the upper leaves will show more spread, the lower ones more droop.
Leaf sap of A. africana is pale honey-coloured (Reynolds, 1974; Van Wyk and Smith, 2003; Jeppe, 1969; Coates Palgrave, 2002).