It is subrectangular in shape, roughly 1.6 metres wide and only 0.4 metres thick, which gives it a flat, almost blade-like profile against the sky. A nearby standing stone lies around 250 metres to the southwest, suggesting that this part of the Cork countryside was once a landscape marked deliberately, its fields punctuated by upright stones whose precise purpose remains a matter of some debate among archaeologists.

Standing stones are among the most enigmatic survivals of prehistoric Ireland. They appear throughout the country as solitary uprights or in loose groupings, and while some are associated with burials or boundary markers, many resist easy categorisation. The Ballyoneen example sits in open pasture, unremarkable to a passing eye but quietly persistent, a large worked or selected stone that someone, at some point in prehistory, considered worth the considerable effort of erecting. Its current lean may reflect centuries of ground movement, animal pressure, or simply the slow give of the soil beneath it.