The nine-metre carnivore with a distinct long nose has been nicknamed "Pinocchio rex".
Its skeleton was dug up in a Chinese construction site and identified by scientists at Edinburgh University in Scotland.
According to their findings, published in the journal Nature Communications, the 66-million-year-old predator would have been as deadly as a tyrannosaur, and perhaps faster.
"This is a different breed of tyrannosaur,” study co-author Dr Steve Brusatte said.
"It has the familiar toothy grin of Tyrannosaurus rex, but its snout was much longer and it had a row of horns on its nose. It might have looked a little comical, but it would have been as deadly as any other tyrannosaur, and maybe even a little faster and stealthier."
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