My Top 10 Favourite Plants of 2025 🌱✨

2025 was a fantastic year for my houseplants, even though some of them did suffer a little bit during the middle of the year when I was just lacking motivation and couldn't get myself to do plant care, a lot of them have still done amazingly this year and I wanted to share with you my top 10 plants from 2025 and kind of talk about them and what makes me so excited about them and all that jazz. Before we get into that though, I want to say if you're new here and you don't know me already, hi my name is Emma and I make houseplanting content all over the internet, so if you want to follow along with my houseplanting journey and maybe learn something along the way, stick around, watch some more of my videos, and subscribe to my channel. If you're not new here, welcome back, I really appreciate you returning. Also this video is sponsored by Willow, who I'll talk about a little bit more later on. Now let's get into these plants. I do want to say they are in no particular order because I don't think I could pick like an exact favorite or like even rank these 10. I have just been so excited about all of them and I'm just so excited to share them with you as well. So let's just get straight into this. I think the first one has got to be my Manjula Pothos. This plant has gone crazy for me this year. I was looking back at my old plant tour video, the one from February time, and I thought it was big then, and holy cow since that time it has grown so much. It has filled the top of the next pole, has gone over the top, I've had to loop it back round because I just don't have any more, I don't have any more space for more moss pole. I suppose I could like chop and extend, but like this thing is as tall as I am. I'm five foot nine, like I am not a small person and this pole is my size which is kind of crazy and it has done so so well. It has also been absolutely fine with my sort of like moss pole watering neglect this year. I haven't been as on top of it as I could have been for this one especially because it's such a gigantic pole that like it does hold on to quite a lot of water and so it releases it very very slowly, but it's just been fine with that and so I'm just so proud of where it has gotten and like to see a plant that you normally see sort of trailing down climbing up a pole and sizing up so amazingly has been a lot of fun and I love watching this one grow and I kind of almost think it doesn't look like a Pothos anymore. It's kind of giving me more Monstera Alba Borsigiana vibes and I'm absolutely here for that because mine didn't have fenestrations anyway so like it's fine, but I just love this one. I love where it's sitting in my living room now because it's kind of the only spot that it can fit. It's next to my tv so I can admire it literally every single day from the couch and I just get to like love on it so much and even though it has gone a little bit smaller at the top again that is because I can't get enough grow light on it. I can't give it any more moss pole and so it hasn't been able to like get even further. It's just gone too far and I can't give it what it needs anymore so I think I will just have to chop and extend at some point in 2026 and we can see how far it goes from there. This next one I know I've been banging on about so much this year but I am astounded with how much it has grown. I was looking back at again my plant tour video from February. A lot of these I'll put in like from back then so you can kind of see how much they've grown over this year. It was only just starting to branch out but this year essentially all of that is doubled in size plus because it has put out branch after branch after branch after branch after branch this entire time and it is just so so cool to see and I love the variegation on it. I love that this whole side is like extremely white. It's got like a really nice white chunk in there and then these sides have a little bit more of the green on them. Also sorry the light's going in and out a little bit. We're just gonna have to live with it. That's just how winter is here but it is just it is so so good and I don't even really have to think about this one all that much as well. I've popped it in front of a bright grow light and that has been fine for it. I've never even repotted this one into different soil. It's just been in the soil it's come in and it's actually funnily enough been putting out like little clovers in there. I don't know how it got those seeds but it's been growing clovers in there and I find it kind of funny because I don't feel like those are the same sort of soil needs but at the same time if it's working I don't need to mess with it and this is obviously working for this euphorbia and it has been growing so well and I just love it so much. This one is probably not a surprise to anyone but my anthurium polliniflorum. Look how big it has gotten. Also like I just love the way it sort of moves. It's almost like a jellyfish and that is so fun. It is so big and beautiful now. The sort of biggest leaves that I've gotten off of it are huge. I think they're like 70 something centimeters these ones which is great and it's putting out a new leaf right now. This one right here and it has only just like unfurled and it's already probably about 50 centimeters maybe more and holy cow I just know that it is doing fantastically and again I don't have this one in an insanely bright spot. It's not a that is probably the coldest room in our house. I don't know why but it just sits a few degrees colder than the rest and this one's been fine with it. It does have like a couple of brown tips. Yes that's fine. I'm hoping that my use of cow mag going forward with it will help it kind of stop doing that because I would prefer if it didn't but all of the sort of like newer leaves don't have that so I'm guessing that it's probably fine and I don't need to worry about it too much but it has just been an absolute pleasure to grow and I could probably put this on a favorite list every single month. It is easily the like easiest anthurium that I've ever grown. I don't need to worry about its humidity. It's got like a grow light kind of but it's mostly just getting ambient light and it has not complained once. Like it doesn't even really lose leaves. I took a leaf off for the first time in maybe like six months or a year today before filming this video and so like it just stays so bushy. It doesn't cycle at all and I am just in love with how big and beautiful it is and again I can't wait to see where it goes next year because this leaf I'm just so excited to see how long it gets because it's already quite a decent length and it is nowhere near close to like firming off yet. It is still sizing up tons. Before we get into the next plant on my favorites list I want to talk about the willow smart plant sensors which have actually been really helpful with my plant care this year and I actually don't keep smart plant sensors in every single one of my plants. I've got about 200. It would be kind of chaotic but I do keep them in a select few plants that I really want to be keeping an eye on whether it is a new plant that I've never tried before like this fiddle leaf fig which I'm trying for the first time this year several years into my plant collecting journey or if it's something that I've moved to a new space and I really want to make sure that it's getting the right environment and the right care in order to stay happy and healthy and these sensors don't just track soil moisture they also track light temperature and humidity and they send you super clear alerts that tell you exactly what the plant needs in those realms and the app is genuinely one of the best I've ever used. It's super clean and minimal and I can really understand what's going on with my plant care. Also the plant nerd in me absolutely loves the data. I can get graphs on my plants and see the sort of light levels and temperature fluctuations over time. One of my favorite things this year to see was when a big tree was cut down outside of my kitchen window and I can actually pinpoint on the graph where that tree got cut down because I can see the amount of light changing so drastically. Just being able to have that information I think is so cool. It just makes plant care so much easier when you can actually understand what's going on and see the sort of trends that are happening within your plants. So if you've been wanting a little bit of extra help for your more difficult plants like this one or you're just tired of not knowing whether or not your soil is actually dry before you water your plants I highly recommend you give Willow a try. I will leave the link down below in the description and don't forget to use my code so you can get a little discount in there. Thank you so much Willow for supporting my channel. Now let's get back to more of my favorites. I don't think my 2025 favorites list would be complete without at least one begonia on it and I think this begonia Arabian sunset is kind of the perfect favorite of my begonias right now because it started the year actually pretty freaking big. It was large already. I had it in the office on that like trellis thing in the corner underneath a Soltech Aspect grow bulb and it was absolutely loving that. It was basically at the top of the like grow light and then midway through the year it was like up against my ceiling and I decided it was time to cut this thing back and I cut the SHIT out of it. I had so many cuttings. I had a whole bucket full of cuttings that I was able to share with so many of you which I absolutely love. I gave tons out to my patrons and I sold some to you guys. I've brought some to swaps throughout the year. I've really been able to share the love with this plant this year and yet I still have a fairly decent sized plant. I think this plant has maybe uh seven or eight cuttings in it which is crazy and I do still have the bottom as well which is doing okay and the amount of resilience this one has is kind of phenomenal. I think it's so cool and also I mean how can I not love these like dark goth black plant leaves? I'm obsessed and like I just can't believe how fast this one grows. Also I'm pretty positive this one had pests earlier in the year and I was able to get rid of those and it's been like it's been an absolute trooper. It just like hasn't cared. I can do almost anything to this one and it has been fine and I love that about it. I mean in general you might see a theme I like to be able to like let my plants kind of go and like do their thing because like they know what they're doing. I'm just trying to help and so if they can do their thing with my limited care at some points in the year that is my sort of ideal and this one is absolutely that. Like it's just I can't believe it's already so full and big. I think it was about the size at the beginning of 2024 when I put it like on that trellis on the wall and it got to the top of that wall in a year and so I know if I put this in that sort of same spot again I can get this one to grow like crazy forever and like it's just been one of the craziest begonias I've ever had and it's kind of crazy that when I got it originally I wasn't into begonias and I didn't even like it. I didn't even like how it looked but now I'm just absolutely obsessed and I think that's quite funny. A Hoya that has brought me immense joy this year is my Hoya globulosa Welsh Mountain Zoo. Like look at the size of this leaf. I've had this one for years and it has been mostly living in my cabinet. I think I got it as like a two or three leaf cutting. It's mostly in my cabinet and just been chilling until this year it kind of overgrew it a little bit. It was giving me lots of tendrils. I ended up cutting those off and moving it outside of the cabinet and since then it has absolutely freaking loved life. I think it almost likes life better outside of the cabinet because it gave me this and all of the new growth since hasn't been quite as big but it still has been bigger than it was when it was inside of the cabinet. Like all of these sort of new leaves are pretty large in comparison to what it was giving me before and I am just astounded by it. This one is again such an easy care one and I love that it's fuzzy. Let me see if I can show you. It's like got velvety bottoms. This is the most reptilian Hoya I think I have in my collection but I kind of love it because it's got those like velvety bottoms. It kind of like takes away that reptilian-ness because it's not like waxy if that makes sense. It's more cuddly instead. I don't know that sounds really weird but that's just how I feel about it and I think it has done phenomenally for me and I'm just so happy with it. Look at that it looks kind of weird and like growing crazy. I don't care. I love that about it and it makes me happy and so that's why it's on this list. I'm actually a little bit surprised by this one. This is my Ficus Elastica Taniki and holy cow this thing has grown this year. It has been insane. Looking back at the old footage, it was so small. I had only just pruned it back and it sort of branched out a little bit and the pruning was down here and so like all of this is pretty much new and I think the biggest change that I've had for it this year has been putting it into semi-hydro. It has absolutely loved that and has grown amazingly since. I have it in a no drainage vessel now and the roots are growing crazy in there. I don't even know if you can see them on that side but you can definitely see them on this side. The roots are growing crazy but also can we look at that size up? The sort of leaf size down here compared to the leaf size up here. It has just done so so well and it's kind of difficult to like properly show you. Oh that's nice. Look at that. It's kind of difficult to properly show you because the leaves are very much so pointing upwards but from my understanding that means that it is happy. When ficuses keep their leaves up it means they're not looking for more light. They're not trying to search out more. They're just content with what it's getting and so I think that's good. This one is in front of same grow light that the Euphorbia is in front of and it is bright and it is absolutely loving that. Eating it straight up and like giving me just the most amazing growth ever. And like I was pretty sure what in 2021 or 2022 that this one was a goner. It had spider mites, we cut it back and I was like I will take a prop, a safety cutting and that's what this has grown into. It's taken years and I think that is because of a lot of neglect but this is the first year that I think I've actually been able to like cater to its watering needs, it is light needs properly and it has like rewarded me for that massively by growing incredibly and I think at some point I will probably have to change out its vessel. Will I ever be able to get it out of this thing because it's got such a bottleneck? I don't know. I didn't think it was actually going to grow this crazy this year hence why I put it in something with such a bottleneck. I was like oh I'll never have to change that. Joke's on me, I do. And so that's maybe a project for the new year but I'm just I'm so impressed with this one and so glad to like finally have this almost looking like a tree again. I feel like it's almost as tall as when I first got it like years ago when I bought it as a full plant. Let me see if I can find an old picture and if I can I'll put it on the screen but I feel like it's almost similar size to then which is kind of crazy considering I've had to like go back to basically nothing with it. Again we're just getting huge in my plant collection. Look at this fern leaf cactus. This is the next plant on my list and I don't really notice how big this one is getting until I look back at the old footage and I compare and I'm like this thing is an absolute beast. It has grown so much for me over this year and it has gotten actually really really long as well. I feel like this branch in particular is huge and it's branching out as well and it's giving me the like very very very fern leaf leaves because I feel like for a while it was kind of giving me these kind of things and I'm like that's not as much of my jam. I wanted it to look proper fern leafy like the kinds you see online. It's doing that now and I am so impressed by it and I love it so much and it's kind of getting to the point where it hangs super unevenly as well like it it leans itself massively forward because it is very much so one-sided but I kind of don't mind that. I think this would look so good oh my god this would look so good almost like mounted on the wall because right now I have it hanging on a tension rod but if it was mounted on the wall kind of coming out that would be so nice. Oh my god okay that's info for me if I ever decide to like rearrange my plant collection or if I ever get a different home in which I can do more on the walls that that would be absolute goals because I think that this one would look amazing like that. I just like love this one so much and again it is so chill so easy care. This is another one that's pet safe it's one that I didn't need to move when we got Cosmo and I can only have him in a room with pet safe plants. I didn't have to worry about this one also didn't even go for it like at all so that's a bonus. This is probably one of my favorite plants of all time and I know I've said that before but I just cannot get over it. It gives me so much jungle vibes and I could literally stare at this one all freaking day. The next plant on this list is a small one but it is still extremely impressive to me. It is my variegated thanksgiving cactus and it is doing so so well in here. I know I just talked about this one in my goals video but seeing how it has progressed over the course of this year has been so cool because like I don't really notice this one is kind of like shoved in the back of my ikea cabinet and it ends up getting blocked by loads of plants so I don't see it every day but I cannot believe how much this one has grown for me. It has done amazing and like even the white bits are still putting out blades even though they don't have any chlorophyll in them. I don't know how they're doing that but like they just keep pumping them out and like I'm not mad at it. Definitely my favorite bits of the plant are the ones that are sort of sectoral variegation that have both the white and green in them. I think those are the prettiest bits but you know it's got a whole chunk of normal green in there too and I'm kind of not mad at that. I feel like once it gets even bigger having some sections with more solid green will look really really nice as a sort of juxtaposition. You know how much I like putting variegated plants with non-variegated plants. I love it. I think it looks so cool and I think it just makes the variegation look so much more special and so I'm not mad that it's got a big green chunk in it but I like these sort of bits the best for sure. This next one is not the easiest to show you because it has gotten so big in 2025. Holy cow this is my Allocasia Stingray and um excuse me what like oh my god it kind of it's gotten to the point in my brain where it's big that I can't even imagine it small anymore. So looking back on what it looked like in January February time this year baffles me that it has grown so much sized up and like matured so so much like look at the size of this I thought it was big back then no no I think this is double the leaf size it was earlier in the year and I am just like oh I am obsessed with it also it has given me so so many corms this year and I've been able to share it with several of you as well which I love. I love when I'm able to share my plants with y'all it makes me so happy that I can share that love and like the joy of this hobby and I just really hope that everyone who I've been able to give a stingray to can get theirs to grow as big as this one because I I am just obsessed with this and I think it being under a grow light from above has been the best thing for it. Earlier in the year I moved it in front of the Soltec Aspect bulb or underneath the Soltec Aspect bulb and it quite loved being there to the point where it was burning its leaves on the light and now I've got it under the Grogane Chloria on my sideboard here and again it loves that it loves the very very bright light and yes it does occasionally touch the light and give itself a burn that happens and that's okay I'm hoping it learns from it it does seem like the stems are getting slightly less long so it's not going to be as leggy but to be honest if my allocation leaves are this big I don't care that the stems are 70 centimeters long because it needs to be that long to support such a big beautiful leaf and so like I cannot be mad I cannot be mad look at that it's so nice I am I'm just astounded by this plant and I love love love love having it in my collection and seeing it every single day and like being able to watch it grow this year has been amazing and then the final plant on this list is one that I actually got this year fairly late in the year actually but it has made such an impression on me all of the recipes I've had since the beginning of the year if not four years prior to this and so I think that's helped to get them to grow really well and big but this one I added to my collection in September time and I'm kind of obsessed I understand the hype now so this is my philodendron and it is not big it is not crazy but I was so so nervous spending my money on this plant luckily this cutting while it was a mid cut was not very expensive it was like 74 76 something pounds which is a really good price for an ilsemonii especially one with what I think is really really nice variegation on it it did just have this single leaf when I got it originally and since then it has rooted insanely like look at those roots in there it had some roots when I originally got it but like I was a little bit worried because I have heard that ilsemonii are notoriously difficult to root and so I was like a little bit nervous but it has rooted really well and since then it has given me this new leaf from the growth point which is so so beautiful it came in this gorgeous pink color which I was really enjoying I don't tend to like pink plants I much prefer when they fade down to like a cream or like a white variegation and so this is kind of the perfect thing where like it starts out a little bit pink and then fades down and it's got another new leaf coming in there now which is so exciting and I'm so excited to see what it grows in as eventually I probably will have to get this on some sort of pole or something in order to hopefully get it to grow leaves this big or even bigger would be a great goal and it's actually living on top of my Ikea shelf in front of a sansi bowl and it kind of likes that it seems to be perfectly happy up there and also this is the first time I've ever used dirty sphagnum it doesn't look fantastic in there does it like because the sphagnum stays quite moist it does get a little bit moldy mildewy on top but like that's really nothing to worry about it is just white mold nothing nothing too intense and it has loved this mix and so I'm very very happy that it went well because that was another thing I was nervous about I was so nervous about this one because it was so expensive relatively as well as like so finicky from what I've heard and so for it to do well for me this year in the like limited amount of time I've had it has been such a joy and I love checking in on this one every day or every week and seeing what it's doing next and getting excited about anything new sort of going on with it and so that is why it has made such an impression and has made my 2025 favorites list so there we go those are my top 10 plans from 2025 I really hope that you have had such a good year as well in terms of your plant growth I'd love to hear some of your favorites down below in the comments what has done super duper well for you or that you've been the most excited about this year let me know in the comments also if you enjoyed this video please give a thumbs up down below and leave a comment on other house 20 things you'd like me to talk about in the future and subscribe for more I hope you're having a fantastic day um happy freaking new year can't wait to see what happens in 2026 and I will see you in the