Shrubs scandent, to 5 m tall. Branchlets brown or reddish brown, terete, soft hairy when young, glabrescent, with sparse, curved minute prickles. Leaves simple; petiole 2–4 cm, villous when young, glabrescent, with sparse, minute prickles; stipules caducous, free, oblong or ovate-lanceolate, 6–9 mm, yellow tomentose-villous, apex palmately lobed, lobes lanceolate; blade ovate to broadly ovate, rarely suborbicular, 8–11 × 5–9 cm, lateral veins 4–6 pairs, raised abaxially, abaxially densely rusty yellow tomentose, with long hairs along veins, adaxially glabrous, base truncate to shallowly cordate, margin undulate or slightly lobed, irregularly coarsely abruptly pointed-serrate, apex acute to shortly acuminate. Inflorescences terminal and axillary, short subracemes, loose, few flowered, sometimes flowers several in clusters in leaf axils or solitary; rachis and pedicels densely yellow tomentose-villous; bracts broadly obovate to oblong, 5–8 mm, yellow tomentose-villous, apex palmately lobed; lobes lanceolate. Pedicel 3–7 mm. Flowers 6–9 mm in diam. Calyx abaxially densely yellow sericeous-villous; sepals erect in fruit, lanceolate, 5–8 × 2.5–4 mm, margin tomentose, apex acuminate; outer sepals apically often lobed, inner sepals entire. Petals suborbicular or obovate, 4–6 × 3.5–5 mm, shorter than sepals, puberulous, base shortly clawed, apex incised. Stamens many, shorter than petals; filaments broader toward base. Pistils longer than stamens; ovary and style glabrous. Aggregate fruit red, glabrous, with few drupelets, enclosed in persistent calyx; pyrenes shallowly rugose. Fl. Jun–Jul, fr. Aug–Sep.

Hills, montane valleys, dense forests; Low to medium elevations. W Guangxi, S Guizhou, Yunnan.