Shrubs, evergreen, to 2 m tall. Bark gray-brownish. Branchlets of current year red-brownish, lustrous, with small prominent lenticels, glabrous; branchlets of previous year grayish, terete, glabrous, with dispersed, small, rounded lenticels. Winter buds ovoid-oblong, with 1 pair of separate scales; scales reddish brown, glabrous, apex acute. Leaves always opposite, not clustered at apices of branchlets; stipules absent; petiole green, slender, 1-2 cm, glabrous; leaf blade purplish when young, ovate to ovate-lanceolate or elliptic to elliptic-oblong, or linear-lanceolate or oblanceolate, 3-9(-11) × 1-4.5 cm, leathery, abaxially sometimes stellate-pubescent in axils of veins, adaxially glabrous, midvein raised abaxially, triplinerved, veins reaching to middle of leaves or above, pinnate, arched, branched, anastomosing near margin, raised abaxially, impressed adaxially, veinlets transverse, conspicuous abaxially, inconspicuous adaxially, not lobed, base subrounded or cuneate, both sides slightly asymmetric, without glands, margin usually remotely serrate, apex acuminate or acute. Flowers appearing after leaves; inflorescence a compound umbel-like cyme, terminal, (2-)4-7 cm in diam.; rays whorled; first node of inflorescence usually with 7 rays, lax, glabrous, without large sterile radiant flowers; peduncles 1.5-2.5(-4) cm, slender; bracts caducous, leaflike, green, linear to linear-lanceolate, glabrous; bracteoles scalelike. Flowers on rays of 3rd order, not fragrant; pedicels 1-2 mm, slender. Calyx greenish; tube obconical, ca. 0.6 mm, glabrous; lobes broadly triangular-ovate, very small, ca. 0.4 mm, glabrous, apex obtuse. Corolla greenish white, rotate, ca. 4 mm in diam., outside glabrous, inside with long hairs at base; tube ca. 1 mm; lobes spreading, broadly ovate, ca. 1 mm, nearly as long as tube, apex rounded, margin entire. Stamens usually slightly longer than corolla, inserted near base of corolla tube; filaments 2-3 mm; anthers yellow, subglobose, ca. 1 mm. Styles nearly as long as calyx lobes; stigmas subsessile. Fruit not turning red, maturing blue-blackish, lustrous, subglobose or ovoid, (3-)5-6 × (3-)3.5-4 mm, base rounded, apex acute, glabrous; pyrenes globose, ca. 4 × 3 mm, with 1 very small and shallow ventral groove or without groove, apex rounded. Fl. Mar-May, fr. May-Oct.

● Forests, scrub; 400-1300 m. Chongqing, N Fujian, S Gansu, N Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, SW and W Hubei, Hunan, N Jiangxi, SW Shaanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan, S Zhejiang.