Trees, up to 20 m tall. Bark gray-brown, scented. Branchlets green, terete; young branchlets sometimes red-brown, ± angled, longitudinally striate, very glabrous. Leaves alternate; petiole 1-2 cm, sulcate adaxially, glabrous; leaf blade green, greenish and opaque abaxially and ± reddish brown and shiny adaxially when dry, variable in shape, broadly ovate, ovate-oblong to oblong, or lanceolate, 6-14 × 1.5-7.5 cm, papery, very glabrous on both surfaces, pinninerved, midrib extending to leaf apex, midrib and lateral veins elevated on both surfaces, lateral veins ca. 5 pairs, arcuate, anastomosing within leaf margin, axils of lateral veins glabrous and conspicuously dome-shaped with 1 or 2 domes abaxially, bullate adaxially, transverse veins and veinlets reticulate, conspicuous on both surfaces, base broadly cuneate to subrounded, always unequal on sides, margin entire, apex obtuse or acute to shortly acuminate. Panicle axillary, usually 4-6 cm, 7-11-flowered, branched; branches short, each bearing a 3-flowered cyme; peduncle 2-4 cm, peduncle and rachis glabrous. Pedicels 2-3.5 mm, very glabrous. Flowers yellow, small, ca. 2 mm. Perianth very glabrous outside, densely sericeous-villous inside; perianth tube obconical, ca. 0.5 mm; perianth lobes 6, broadly ovate, subequal, ca. 1.5 × 1.1 mm, obtuse. Fertile stamens 9, ca. 1 mm (of 1st and 2nd whorls) or ca. 1.2 mm (of 3rd whorl); filaments complanate, villous, those of 3rd whorl each with 2 sessile glands near base, others glandless; anthers broadly ovate and almost as long as filaments (of 1st and 2nd whorls) or oblong and slightly shorter than filaments (of 3rd whorl), all obtuse, 4-celled; cells introrse (of 1st and 2nd whorls) or extrorse (of 3rd whorl). Staminodes 3, short, spatulate, ca. 0.6 mm, stalked. Ovary ovoid, ca. 0.8 mm, glabrous; style short, ca. 0.7 mm; stigma inconspicuous. Fruit subglobose, ca. 8 mm in diam., apiculate; perianth cup in fruit dilated, up to 12 mm, longitudinally sulcate when dry, apex ca. 7 mm wide. Fl. Jun-Aug, fr. Aug-Dec.

● Sparse forests beside ditches on mountain slopes, dense valley forests; 300-600 m. S and SE Yunnan.