How Much Sunlight Do Your Outdoor Tropical Plants Really Need?

Some questions are tricky, like, would you rather have chocolate ice cream or mint chip? 

Compared to crucial ice cream pondering, tropical plant care actually seems simple. 

How much sunlight do tropical plants need? Grab your sunglasses and let’s take a look. (You can bring your ice cream with you.) 

First, It Depends on the Plant 

This is sunny Florida, so, as you might expect, lots of our favorite plants love the sun. But not all of them.

When it comes to sunlight, how to care for tropical foliage? 

What plants thrive in full sun? Check out a few favorites: 

Bougainvillea

This pretty plant will bloom all year if it’s in full sun, offering you an explosion of stunning colors — pink, magenta, purple, red, orange, yellow.

Hibiscus

Ready for stunning flowers up to nearly 10 inches in diameter? Hi, hibiscus. The ultimate tropical paradise flower, it comes in a wide range of colors, from white to red, pink, yellow, and orange. 

Pitch Apple 

This is one of the hottest plants in Sarasota, popular for its versatile use as a shrub, hedge or tree. 

Bonus: its nickname is “autograph plant,” as you can sign its leathery leaves with a toothpick or skewer and it will lighten and stay there for good. (Cool party trick.)

This drought-tolerant evergreen also holds its own against insects and diseases.

Blue Daze

Tropical plant care? This easy-care ground cover hardly needs any, and it loves the heat and sun. Its brilliant blue flowers open in the morning and close up in the evening.

Check out ‘Blue My Mind,' an improved variety that’s more compact and offers even more of those vivid blue flowers.

Petite Ixora 

This spectacular sun-loving shrub offers clusters of tubular flowers in bright red, orange, yellow, pink, or white. Ixora flowers throughout the year, and each flower cluster can last between six and eight weeks, giving your landscape long-lasting color.

African Iris

This beauty can tolerate partial shade but blooms best in full sun for at least six hours a day. The six-petal white flower with a smaller four-petal blue-purple flower in its center will wow you. 

Who Loves Shade? Raise Your Leaf

How much sunlight do tropical plants need? Some hardly need any. 

Who are they? 

Variegated Shell Ginger

This shade-loving stunner boasts boldly striped yellow and green foliage and clusters of sweetly fragrant white and pink shell-like flowers. 

Wild Coffee

Wild coffee produces cool red fruit that looks like coffee beans.

Wart Fern

Its prettier name is monarch fern, but with its intriguing, wart-like bumps, wart fern suits it. 

This pretty fern thrives in part or full shade, so it’s perfect in a garden with indirect or low light. 

Coontie

Another weird name for a pretty cool plant.
These primitive plants, native to Florida, have been around since the dinosaurs roamed so they can probably survive your gardening skills. Coontie looks like a small fern, with glossy, featherlike leaves. 

Firespike

Firespike is a bit tricky when it comes to light. It doesn’t like hot afternoon sun, but its flowers won’t be as plentiful or vibrant if it gets too much shade. It’s worth figuring out, though — its regal spikes of pretty red flowers attract hummingbirds and butterflies. 

Philodendron ‘Wilsonii’

This tropical beauty with huge leaves makes a wow-worthy focal point in a shady garden. Its impressive leaves can grow to three feet long! But they’ll easily burn in the sun. 

What Does “Full Sun” Actually Mean for Tropical Plant Care?

When a plant tag tells you a plant needs “full sun,” that typically means 6-8 hours of sunlight. But it’s not that simple. There’s a difference between morning sun and afternoon sun.

Afternoon sun is stronger, so even if a plant that likes full sun doesn’t start getting sun until noon, that’s considered full sun. The rays are stronger. 

If a plant needs full sun, but only gets the morning’s rays, that may not be enough sun for it to thrive. 

A plant that’s only getting morning sun is getting “part sun,” and some plants are fine with that. 

How much sunlight do tropical plants need? It’s important to pay attention to what time of day your plants are actually in the sunlight. 

If a plant tag tells you a plant prefers shade, it’s usually fine if it gets a bit of sun. 

No Shade? Make Some! 

Maybe you have your heart set on some pretty shade-loving plants. There are some beauties. 

One of our customers wanted a garden of only white flowers. Stunning! But most white flowers don’t like full sun. 

So, we created some shade, installing a few sheltering palm trees and a ‘Lakeview’ jasmine tree, a tropical evergreen tree with glossy foliage and scented white flowers. 

That provided the shade needed for striking begonia ‘Alba,” with its long-lasting sprays of delicate white flowers that brighten up dark, shady areas. 

Too Much Sun? Not Enough? Your Plants Will Tell You

 How much sunlight do tropical plants need? Plants will tell you if they’re getting too much or not enough sun. 

They won’t whisper in your ear or write you a secret message in invisible ink, although either of those would be cool. 

You have to look at them. 

If a plant is getting too much sun, its color will fade or its leaves will turn brown and look burned.

Variegated shell ginger, for example, craves shade. Too much sun and its leaves will burn.

Here’s the tricky thing — a plant’s color can also wash out if it’s getting too much water. 

That’s why it’s good to have a plant health care pro on board who can help diagnose your tropical plant care problem.

Get on board with a comprehensive plant health care program, and experts will catch things like too much sun, too much water, damaging insects or undernourished plants early, before the distressing damage is done. 

We know how to maintain tropical plants so they thrive, with six targeted visits a year to nab everything from pesky white flies to extra hungry Ixora — and the many potential tropical plant care problems in between. 

Tropical Plant Care: Don’t Forget the Mulch 

Full sun plants can dry out fast, basking in the hot sun for hours. Mulch helps them conserve water, keeping valuable moisture in the soil. 

Hardwood mulch also keeps weeds from easily sprouting and as it decomposes over time, adds nutrients to your soil. It’s a crucial part of tropical plant care. 

Shoot for a solid three inches of mulch. And aim for a fresh delivery twice a year, in March, then November, so your mulch always looks — and works — great. 

Start Your Tropical Plant Care with Expert Design

 How much sunlight do tropical plants need? A skilled designer knows, and can make sure you get the right plants for your yard’s conditions, so they thrive. 

But there’s more to choosing plants than knowing light conditions. A good designer will help you choose the right plants by asking you a ton of questions, from what colors you love to what pets share your yard.

Pros know the best tropical plants for Florida landscapes, including exactly what plants thrive here in Sarasota, and which ones will do great in your particular backyard tropical paradise. 

How Much Sun for Your Tropical Plant Care? Talk to Us 

Not sure what plants will love to share your backyard tropical paradise? 

Tropical Gardens offers landscape design services in Sarasota, Florida that make it easy. 

Our landscape design and build teams can create the backyard tropical paradise you crave, with just the right plants. Then, our residential maintenance team can keep it healthy and thriving. 

Let’s get started. 

Give us a call or fill out our form today! Sun? Shade? Some of each? We’ll help you figure it all out. Our team of Sarasota designers can’t wait to dive in.