Small trees, 3–8 m tall; young shoots ca. 5 mm in diam., densely red-brown-tomentose. Petiole 10–15 mm, brown-tomentose; leaf blade leathery, oblanceolate to oblong-elliptic, 7–12 × 2.5–4 cm; base cuneate; margin slightly revolute; apex bluntly or sharply acute, apiculate; abaxial surface with indumentum 2-layered, upper layer thick, red-brown, sometimes deciduous, hairs branched, lower layer gray-white, appressed; adaxial surface appearing bullate-rugose, glabrescent; veins conspicuously and deeply impressed. Inflorescence umbellate, 6–9-flowered; rachis ca. 3 mm, densely brown-tomentose. Pedicel 1–1.5 cm, similarly hairy; calyx lobes 5, ca. 2 mm, tomentose; corolla funnel-campanulate, pink to purplish, with purple spots on corolla-tube and upper lobes, 4–5 cm, puberulent near base inside, lobes 5; stamens 10, unequal, filaments pubescent at base; ovary ca. 6 mm, densely tomentose; style ca. 4 cm, glabrous, rarely pubescent at base; stigma capitate. Capsule cylindric, green, 20–25 × 6–9 mm, hairy. Fl. Apr–Jun, fr. Jul–Oct.

It is probable that this species belongs to Rhododendron subsect. Argyrophylla, not to R. subsect. Taliensia; it may be closely allied to R. denudatum.

Mixed forests, mountain slopes; 1200–2300 m. N and SE Guizhou, S Sichuan, NE Yunnan.