A cashel is a type of ringfort defined by a circular or subcircular enclosure wall built from drystone, that is, stone laid without mortar, and in Ireland such structures were typically the defended homesteads of farming families during the early medieval period, roughly the sixth to twelfth centuries. At Caherbroder, that wall has long since collapsed, and what remains is a low, irregular spread of stone obscured by dense vegetation, tracing an outline roughly 53 metres across its longest axis.

The site carries the usual quiet indignities of a structure that has outlasted anyone's interest in maintaining it. A modern field boundary cuts directly across the south-western quadrant of the interior, bisecting what would once have been the enclosed living space, and gaps visible at the north-east and east-north-east of the circuit appear to be later interventions rather than original entrances. The name Caherbroder preserves the Irish word cathair, itself a term for a stone ringfort, so the place has been identified by its structure for long enough that the word became part of the townland name, even as the structure itself faded into the field.