Shrubs, usually 1-3 m tall. Young branches triquetrous, with sparse appressed short hairs or glabrous; older parts terete, glabrescent. Petiole bisulcate or convex above, often winged along both sides, ridged beneath, 0.5-6 cm, sparsely shortly appressed hairy or glabrous; stipels rarely present, linear, 1-2 mm; leaflets obovate, oblong, or ovate to narrowly ovate or elliptic, rarely linear, terminal one 1.2-5 × 0.8-3 cm, abaxially sparsely shortly appressed hairy or glabrescent, adaxially glabrous, base obtuse or cuneate, apex retuse and mucronulate. Racemes 3-26 cm, sometimes paniculate; rachis and pedicels with sparse appressed or ascending short hairs or glabrescent. Pedicels 3-10 mm. Calyx with ± dense appressed short hairs; tube 2-2.5 mm; lobes narrowly triangular, lower lobe 3-4.5 mm, longer than others, upper lobe 2-2.5 mm, lateral lobes 2-2.5 mm. Corolla yellow or purple; standard elliptic, 9-11 mm, apex obtuse; wings 9-10.5 mm, clawed at base; keel incurved, 12-15 mm, clawed at base. Ovary narrowly ovoid, 2.2-2.5 mm, shortly hairy; style 8-8.5 mm. Legumes obliquely obovoid, 6-8 × 4-4.5 mm, shortly ascending hairy, apex rounded. Seeds purplish brown, oblong, 3-3.7 × ca. 2 mm. Fl. Jul-Nov, fr. Oct-Dec.

The whole plant is used medicinally for reducing fever and re­lieving coughs. The roots are used for treating mastitis and strokes.

● Mountain slopes, thickets, forest margins, forests, grasslands, roadsides; 1000-3000 m. Guangxi, Guizhou, Sichuan, Yunnan.