Shrubs or small trees, deciduous, 3–10 m tall. Branchlets dark reddish brown or purplish brown when young, grayish black when old, initially densely gray villous, glabrous when old, with elliptic lenticels; buds narrowly ovoid, 3–5 × 2–3 mm, apex acute; scales several, brown, villous. Petiole 3–10 mm, gray villous; leaf blade obovate-oblong or oblong-lanceolate to narrowly lanceolate, 5–11 × 2–5 cm, papery, veins 5–8 pairs, both surfaces sparsely gray villous when young, later glabrous or only with few long hairs along veins abaxially, base attenuate or broadly cuneate, margin sparsely serrate, apex acute or obtuse. Compound corymbs terminal, 4–6(–7) × 5–7 cm, numerous flowered; peduncles and pedicels gray villous; bracts subulate, 2–4 mm, villous. Pedicel 3–5 mm. Flowers 7–8 mm in diam. Hypanthium cupular, 3–4 mm, abaxially villous. Sepals triangular, 1–1.5 mm. Petals white, obovate or orbicular, 3–4 mm, adaxially glabrous or puberulous, apex obtuse or emarginate. Stamens 20, nearly as long as or slightly shorter than petals. Styles 2 or 3, somewhat not exceeding stamens, glabrous, connate basally. Fruit ovoid or subglobose, 4–6 × 3–5 mm, sparsely yellow pubescent. Fl. Mar–May, fr. Jul–Aug.

Slopes, mountain valleys, forests, thickets, roadsides, river banks; 200--2500 m. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Hubei, Hunan, Yunnan, Zhejiang [Laos, Thailand, Vietnam].