Shrubs or small trees to 12(-15) m tall; trunk to 1.2 m d.b.h.; bark reddish, gray, or grayish brown. Leafy branchlets elliptic, oblong, or more usually obovate-rectangular in outline, plane, 5-12(-18) × 4-8(-10) cm. Leaves borne ± perpendicular to branchlet axis, or directed forward at 50-85° ; petiole 0-1 (-2.5) mm; blade green adaxially, linear or linear-lanceolate, ± parallel sided almost throughout length and tapered from near apex only, or tapered from point above middle of blade but well below apex, straight or very slightly falcate, flat, (1-)1.8-5(-7) cm × 2-3.5(-4) mm, 7-10 × as long as wide, leathery but relatively soft, midvein 0.2-0.6 mm wide abaxially, stomatal bands white (very rarely green), 0.8-1.2 mm wide, of (12-)13-15(-18) rows of stomata, 2-4 × as wide as midvein, marginal bands 0.1-0.3 mm wide, base cuneate or rounded-cuneate, symmetric or very slightly asymmetric, margin narrowly revolute, apex acute and shortly mucronate to long acuminate. Pollen-cone capitula globose, 4-7 mm in diam., each of 6 or 7 pinkish brown cones; peduncle ca. 3 mm, naked except at apex; microsporophylls 4-11, each with (2 or)3(or 4) pollen sacs. Seed cones solitary or borne 2-5(-8) together; peduncle 3-8 mm; seed scales grayish green, ovate, apex shortly cuspidate. Aril red or reddish purple when ripe, 1.6-2.5 × 0.8-1.6 cm, with 6 prominent, longitudinal ridges. Seeds ovoid or obovoid to ellipsoid, 1.8-2.5 × 0.9-1.2 cm, apex mucronate or cuspidate. Pollination Mar-Jun, seed maturity (Jun-)Jul-Nov.

* Montane coniferous or mixed forests, thickets, stream valleys, valley bottoms, open situations, on granite, sandstone, and limestone substrates; 600-3000(-3200) m. S Anhui, Fujian, S Gansu, SW Guangdong, Guangxi, NE Guizhou, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, S Jiangsu, Jiangxi, S Shaanxi, Sichuan, C and N Taiwan, SE Yunnan, Zhejiang; cultivated in Shandong.