Sorex salvini is known from the highlands of western and central Guatemala. Its species treatment places it in broad-leaved and coniferous cloud forests. The treatment follows the separation of S. salvini from S. saussurei supported by morphological work in 2017.
The back is grayish brown and the underside is about the same shade. The tail is slightly bicolored, grayish brown above and a little paler below.
This mountain shrew eats insects. The digestive tract of a female from Finca la Chingada, Guatemala, contained numerous insect fragments, including legs and pieces of the hard dorsal covering.
The female was caught in a pitfall in June 2006 at 2,720 metres, in the lower part of disturbed cloud forest. No internal parasites were found in its digestive tract. A male and female were also collected at Finca Chinaux in January 2003. A 2017 revision retained all three vouchers as this species, connecting these scarce natural-history records to its revised identity.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
During the 2006 visit to Finca la Chingada, researchers observed trees being cut and removed for firewood. This documents forest-use pressure at a confirmed collection locality.