Shrubs to 2.5 m tall. Branchlets slightly tortuous, brown to gray-brown, slender, puberulous when young, later glabrous; buds long ovoid, usually longer than petioles, with 2 scales, glabrous, apex acuminate. Petiole 2–5 mm, glabrous; leaf blade ovate-lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 2–4 × 1–2 cm, abaxially glabrous or pilose on veins, adaxially pilose initially, glabrescent later, base broadly cuneate or rounded, margin incised doubly serrate and with some simple teeth, apex acute. Corymbs terminal on lateral branchlets, compound, 4–8 × 4–6(–8) cm, densely many flowered; rachis and pedicels pilose or subglabrous; pedicels 4–6 mm; bracts ovate-lanceolate to linear-lanceolate, 4–6 mm, pubescent on both surfaces when young, eventually glabrescent. Flowers 5–6 mm in diam. Hypanthium campanulate, pubescent abaxially. Sepals triangular, 1–1.5 mm, erect or reflexed in fruit. Petals white, suborbicular, 2–2.5 mm, about as broad as long, glabrous, base shortly clawed, apex obtuse. Stamens 15–20, longer than petals. Disk annular, equally 10-lobed. Carpels pubescent; styles shorter than stamens. Follicles semispreading, pilose or glabrous; styles terminal on abaxial side, divergent. Fl. May–Jul, fr. Aug–Oct.

Dry rocky slopes, roadsides; 2500--3400 m. Gansu, Hubei, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Sichuan, Xizang, Yunnan, Zhejiang.