Herbs, perennial, 4-30 cm tall, often caespitose; rhizome slender. Stems usually several, rarely solitary, erect to ascending, green or purplish in lower part, often branched, hispid-villous, sparsely so in lower part and on lower leaves, more densely so in upper part, stipitate glandular below capitula, loosely leafy. Leaves: basal withered at anthesis, petiolate, petiole base clasping, blade oblanceolate, 1.2-8 × 0.25-1 cm, surfaces glabrous or glabrate, base attenuate, petiole and margin hirsute-villous-ciliate, apex acute; lower cauline shortly petiolate, blade oblanceolate, mid and upper sessile, lanceolate to linear-lanceolate, 1.5-6.5 × 0.1-0.6 cm, base subclasping, apex acute. Capitula 2-14 in corymbiform synflorescences, sometimes solitary, 0.9-1.6 × 1.8-3.3 cm. Involucre hemispheric; phyllaries green, linear-lanceolate, 5.5-9 × 0.5-1 mm, apex acute, outer slightly shorter, hirsute-villous, inner with margin scarious, stipitate glandular. Ray florets lilac, 6.5-8(-13) mm, tube 1.5-2.5 mm, apically sparsely hairy, lamina ± flat; disk florets yellow, 4.5-5 mm, limb funnelform, lobes lanceolate, ca. 0.5 mm, glabrous. Achenes tan, oblanceoloid, compressed, 2.2-2.6 mm, strigose. Pappus 2-seriate, outer bristles ca. 0.7 mm, inner 4.3-5 mm. Fl. Jul-Sep.

Subalpine meadows; ca. 2600 m. C Xinjiang [Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan].