Calophyllum inophyllumL.

Alexandrian LaurelAlexandrian laurelBeach CalophyllumBorneo Mahogany

WFO wfo-0000581184 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Calophyllum inophyllum, photographed by Don Loarie
fig. a Don Loarie, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-22 / obs. 203646950

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 61 botanical countries

Regions where Calophyllum inophyllum is native: Aldabra, Chagos Archipelago, Comoros, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Mozambique Channel Is., Réunion, Rodrigues, Seychelles, Tanzania, Hainan, Kazan-retto, Nansei-shoto, Ogasawara-shoto, Taiwan, Andaman Is., Bangladesh, Bismarck Archipelago, Borneo, Cambodia, Christmas I., Cocos (Keeling) Is., India, Jawa, Laccadive Is., Laos, Lesser Sunda Is., Malaya, Maldives, Maluku, Myanmar, New Guinea, Nicobar Is., Philippines, Solomon Is., South China Sea, Sri Lanka, Sulawesi, Sumatera, Thailand, Vietnam, Queensland, Caroline Is., Cook Is., Fiji, Gilbert Is., Hawaii, Marianas, Marshall Is., Nauru, New Caledonia, Niue, Samoa, Santa Cruz Is., Tokelau-Manihiki, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Wallis-Futuna Is. KenyaMadagascarMozambiqueTanzaniaHainanTaiwanBangladeshBismarck ArchipelagoBorneoCambodiaIndiaJawaLaosLesser Sunda Is.MalayaMalukuMyanmarNew GuineaPhilippinesSolomon Is.Sri LankaSulawesiSumateraThailandVietnamQueenslandFijiHawaiiNew Caledonia AldabraChagos ArchipelagoComorosMauritiusMozambique Channel Is.RéunionRodriguesSeychellesNansei-shotoAndaman Is.Christmas I.Laccadive Is.MaldivesNicobar Is.South China SeaCaroline Is.Cook Is.MarianasMarshall Is.NauruNiueSamoaTokelau-ManihikiTongaTuvaluVanuatuWallis-Futuna Is.
Native distribution of Calophyllum inophyllum, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Andaman Is. AND ASIA-TROPICAL
Bangladesh BAN
Bismarck Archipelago BIS
Borneo BOR
Cambodia CBD
Christmas I. XMS
Cocos (Keeling) Is. CKI
India IND
Jawa JAW
Laccadive Is. LDV
Laos LAO
Lesser Sunda Is. LSI
Malaya MLY
Maldives MDV
Maluku MOL
Myanmar MYA
New Guinea NWG
Nicobar Is. NCB
Philippines PHI
Solomon Is. SOL
South China Sea SCS
Sri Lanka SRL
Sulawesi SUL
Sumatera SUM
Thailand THA
Vietnam VIE
Caroline Is. CRL PACIFIC
Cook Is. COO
Fiji FIJ
Gilbert Is. GIL
Hawaii HAW
Marianas MRN
Marshall Is. MRS
Nauru NRU
New Caledonia NWC
Niue NUE
Samoa SAM
Santa Cruz Is. SCZ
Tokelau-Manihiki TOK
Tonga TON
Tuvalu TUV
Vanuatu VAN
Wallis-Futuna Is. WAL
Aldabra ALD AFRICA
Chagos Archipelago CGS
Comoros COM
Kenya KEN
Madagascar MDG
Mauritius MAU
Mozambique MOZ
Mozambique Channel Is. MCI
Réunion REU
Rodrigues ROD
Seychelles SEY
Tanzania TAN
Hainan CHH ASIA-TEMPERATE
Kazan-retto KZN
Nansei-shoto NNS
Ogasawara-shoto OGA
Taiwan TAI
Queensland QLD AUSTRALASIA

Not drawn on the map: Kazan-retto, Ogasawara-shoto, Cocos (Keeling) Is., Gilbert Is., Santa Cruz Is.. We hold no public-domain boundary for these regions, so they are listed rather than guessed at.

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 82 in flower of 214 examined

Proportion of examined Calophyllum inophyllum in flower, by month
Month In flower Examined Share 95% interval
Jan 7 11 64% 35% to 85%
Feb 6 11 55% 28% to 79%
Mar 13 29 45% 28% to 62%
Apr 8 26 31% 17% to 50%
May 7 18 39% 20% to 61%
Jun 6 25 24% 12% to 43%
Jul 2 14 14% 4% to 40%
Aug 0 18 0% 0% to 18%
Sep 4 20 20% 8% to 42%
Oct 9 15 60% 36% to 80%
Nov 12 16 75% 51% to 90%
Dec 8 11 73% 43% to 90%

Peak flowering in Nov. Each bar is the share of Calophyllum inophyllum observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 82 of 214 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Where it actually grows measured, from 1,836 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 16.9 °C 21.3 °C 25.6 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 26.5 °C 28.4 °C 33.3 °C
Annual rainfall 875 mm 2,190 mm 3,865 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 49 mm 228 mm 609 mm

It is not found anywhere that gets close to freezing. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 1,836 research-grade observations of Calophyllum inophyllum that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 11 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Balsamaria inophyllum Lour.
  • Calophyllum apetalum Blanco
  • Calophyllum bingator Roxb.
  • Calophyllum bintagor Roxb.
  • Calophyllum blumei Wight
  • Calophyllum inophyllum f. oblongata Miq.
  • Calophyllum inophyllum f. obovata Miq.
  • Calophyllum inophyllum var. takamaka Fosberg
  • Calophyllum inophyllum var. wakamatsui (Kaneh.) Fosberg & Sachet
  • Calophyllum ovatifolium Noronha
  • Calophyllum wakamatsui Kaneh.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.