A living atlas of the palms

Palmae

An interactive atlas of the entire palm family — Arecaceae, traditionally Palmae — covering 2,591 accepted species: where they grow, how they are related, which are at risk, and the climate they live in.

2,591 species · 86% placed on the phylogeny · 1,238 threatened. Nothing here is illustrative filler: every point, branch, and status traces to a published dataset, and every approximation is labelled.

What's inside

• Workbench — a linked phylogeny and world map: click a clade to see where it lives, or a region to light up its species.
• World Atlas — native palm richness across the TDWG regions of the world.
• Palm Line — every native occurrence coloured by the coldest-month temperature where it grows, tracing the frost line palms have marked for 50 million years.
• Field Guide — a searchable card for each species: range, traits, conservation status, climate, and a photograph.

Data

Built on WCVP names, PalmTraits 1.0, TDWG WGSRPD level-3 ranges, the Faurby 2016 species phylogeny and Yao 2023 genus phylogeny, GBIF occurrences × WorldClim climate, the Bellot et al. 2022 extinction-risk model, and the IUCN Red List. Each is credited in full, with its DOI, on the sources page.

This is an interactive application; enable JavaScript for the full linked tree-and-map workbench. Built by Peter Repetti.