Roystonea regia(Kunth) O.F.Cook

Cuban Royal Palm

WFO wfo-0000298342 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Roystonea regia, photographed by Pete Grannis
fig. a Pete Grannis, CC BY 4.0 / 2020-04-23 / obs. 68272279
Roystonea regia, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. b Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 31225964
Roystonea regia, photographed by Brandon Corder
fig. c Brandon Corder, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 107262873
Roystonea regia, photographed by Ben Machado
fig. d Ben Machado, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 19154505
Roystonea regia, photographed by amantedarmanin
fig. e amantedarmanin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 147572849
Roystonea regia, photographed by amantedarmanin
fig. f amantedarmanin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 128366991
Roystonea regia, photographed by Andre Hosper
fig. g Andre Hosper, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 9497287
Roystonea regia, photographed by Andre Hosper
fig. h Andre Hosper, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 9264337

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 10 botanical countries

Regions where Roystonea regia is native: Florida, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Southeast, Bahamas, Belize, Cayman Is., Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Honduras FloridaMexico GulfMexico SoutheastBelizeCubaDominican RepublicHaitiHonduras BahamasCayman Is.
Native distribution of Roystonea regia, 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
Bahamas BAH SOUTHERN AMERICA
Belize BLZ
Cayman Is. CAY
Cuba CUB
Dominican Republic DOM
Haiti HAI
Honduras HON
Florida FLA NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Gulf MXG
Mexico Southeast MXT

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.

Also published as 10 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.

  • Euterpe jenmanii C.H.Wright
  • Euterpe ventricosa C.H.Wright
  • Oenocarpus regius (Kunth) Spreng.
  • Oreodoxa regia Kunth
  • Palma elata W.Bartram
  • Roystonea elata (W.Bartram) F.Harper
  • Roystonea floridana O.F.Cook
  • Roystonea jenmanii (C.H.Wright) Burret
  • Roystonea regia var. hondurensis P.H.Allen
  • Roystonea ventricosa (C.H.Wright) L.H.Bailey

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.