Subshrubs, 1-2.5 m tall. Branches becoming somewhat tetragonous, glabrous. Leaves opposite, elliptic to broadly elliptic, 1-2.8 cm × 4-8 cm, strigose, abaxially more densely strigose, base attenuate to short petiole, margin entire. Cymes terminal, paniculate, to 20 cm, densely rust-colored short hispid. Pedicel slender, usually irregularly curved; bracts ovate-lanceolate to lanceolate, 2-4 × 0.5-1.5 cm, ± sessile. Calyx campanulate, ca. 1.5 cm, enlarged and inflated in fruit to 4 cm wide, strigose outside; lobes ovate-triangular, apex caudate-attenuate. Corolla white or pinkish, slightly longer than calyx, densely tomentose below inside; throat 10-appendaged; lobes ovate. Anthers lanceolate, connectives exserted from corolla. Ovary 1-3-lobed, other lobes aborted. Nutlets broadly ovoid, ca. 5 × 4 mm, margin of abaxial surface leathery, irregularly obtuse-dentate. Seeds orbicular, complanate. Fl. Jan-Mar.

Hillside meadows, thickets, forests; 500-2200 m. Guizhou, Taiwan, Yunnan [India, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand]