The Burmese Shrike has a blue-grey head and upper back, with chestnut across the rest of the upperparts. Yunnan records also describe it taking insects and small animals such as lizards.
Adult males of the nominate subspecies have a blue-grey head and upper back, chestnut back and rump, white outer tail feathers, pale underparts, and a dark area around the eye.
In Yunnan, it perches on trees or shrubs in farmland, cultivated slopes, and forest edges. It takes grasshoppers, other insects, lizards, and small land animals, and may return to the same perch after a catch.
The 13 stomachs examined in Yunnan contained animal food, including beetle larvae, grasshoppers, moths, ants and termites.
Adult nominate females in the Yunnan account have whitish at the base of the forehead and in front of the eyes; they resemble males but are duller.
A juvenile collected in Yunnan in June 1985 had a dark brown head and upper back with fine pale-brown bars, and dark barring on the lower back.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.