Trees or shrubs, 1.5--6 m tall. Trunk to 18 cm d.b.h. Branchlets terete, densely stellate tomentose, becoming purple and glabrescent. Leaves alternate; petiole 2--3 mm; leaf blade ovate-oblong, ovate, or elliptic, 3.5--8.5 X 2--4.5 cm, papery, abaxially densely gray-yellow stellate tomentose and pubescent, adaxially rugose and with simple and 2- or 3-radiate to stellate hairs but glabrescent, base rounded to broadly cuneate, margin serrate or apically with unequal deltoid serrations, apex acuminate to rarely acute, secondary veins 4--7 pairs, tertiary veins parallel. Racemes terminal, 3--6-flowered, 5--6 cm; bracteoles linear, 6--12 mm. Flowers ca. 1.6 cm. Pedicel 3--4 mm. Calyx ca. 4.5 X 3.5--5 mm, tube densely yellow-brown stellate tomentose; teeth lanceolate to subulate, 1.2--3 mm. Corolla tube 4--5 mm; lobes elliptic to obovate, 5--10 X 4--5 mm. Filaments white stellate villose. Fruit ovoid, ca. 8 mm in diam., irregularly rugose, densely yellow-brown stellate pubescent. Seeds 1 or 2, brown, ribbed, glabrous. Fl. Apr-Jun, fr. Sep-Nov.

Forests; 1000--1500 m. S Yunnan [India, Myanmar].