It’s been considered a synonym of Schistura caudofurca (Mai, 1978) by the majority of recent authors following Kottelat (2001) but this appears to be a case of misidentification since the two species exhibit several notable differences based on their respective descriptions (Endruweit, 2010).

At the type locality of the congener S. lixianjiangensis sympatric species included Balitora kwangsiensis, Glyptothorax quadriocellatus, Garra orientalis, Hemibagrus pluriradtus, Poropuntius huangchieni, Pseudecheneis paviei,…

Type locality is given as ‘Babianjiang River, 24°20’N, 100°10’E, Jingdong County, Yunnan Province, China’. The Babianjiang joins the Mengyejiang River to form the Langmajiang River, a tributary of the Lixianjiang (Black River) within the Red River basin.