The dimensions are modest but precise: roughly 42 metres east to west and 20 metres north to south, making it a noticeably elongated shape rather than the more familiar circular form most people picture when they think of an Irish ringfort.

A rath is an early medieval enclosure, typically dating from somewhere between the sixth and tenth centuries, built by raising a bank of earth around a farmstead and digging a fosse, or ditch, on the outside of it. The bank and fosse together formed a boundary that was as much a social marker as a defensive one, signalling the status and territory of the household within. At Ballydavid, the bank survives in fair condition, but the external fosse has largely disappeared beneath centuries of agriculture and soil movement. It remains visible only along the northern side, where the ground has been kinder to it, preserving a faint depression that hints at what once ran the full perimeter of the enclosure.