The ships were long between perpendiculars and had a beam of and a mean draft of . They displaced as built. By 1910, their displacement had increased slightly, to . Approximately 400 officers and men crewed each ship. The ships were powered by a pair of triple expansion steam engines with four double-ended cylindrical boilers; they were rated at and provided a top speed of . Coal storage amounted to The boilers were trunked into two funnels.Gardiner & Gray, p. 383Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, p. 427 The hull was divided into 118 watertight compartments.
