This dark shrew lives in India’s Western Ghats. It is mainly associated with wet montane forest, but a study also recorded it in wet mixed deciduous forest at 600 m.
Its body is blackish, including the hands, feet, tail, ears, and muzzle, and it is smaller than the related S. murinus. Its slender tail bears black hairs.
It is reported as nocturnal or crepuscular and semi-fossorial, living away from human settlements. Earlier records were from wet montane forest at 900–2,400 m; the Mookambika study added a record in wet mixed deciduous forest at 600 m.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.