The spider plant (Chlorophytum comosum) is a foliage plant with narrow, ribbon-shaped leaves that grow from a dense rosette and arch outwards. It reaches 30 to 45 cm in height and about the same across, and sends out stems of up to 75 cm with ready-made plantlets on the end. Two problems come back for almost everyone who keeps one: brown leaf tips and runners that never appear. Both have more to do with the water and the pot size than with humidity.
Brown leaf tips usually come from the water
The most common advice is that the air is too dry. That is sometimes true, but the spider plant reacts strongly to fluoride and chlorine in tap water, and that is at least as often the explanation. The damage shows at the very end of the leaf: a dry, brown tip of 2 to 10 mm with a pale yellow zone just inside it, while the rest of the leaf is healthy. If the whole leaf has yellowed, something else is wrong.
Chlorine leaves the water if you pour it into an open jug and let it stand for a day. Fluoride does not. It never evaporates. If the tips come back after a few weeks of water that has been left standing, you need to change your water source. Rainwater and deionised water contain neither chlorine nor fluoride. Softened water is the worst of all, because it swaps calcium for sodium, which builds up in the soil.
| Cause | How to recognise it | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Chlorine in the tap water | Comes on slowly across many leaves at once | Let the water stand for a day |
| Fluoride in the tap water | Keeps coming even though the water has been left standing | Switch to rainwater or deionised water |
| Salts from fertiliser | White crust on the soil surface, tips darken soon after feeding | Flush the soil through and feed less often |
| Dry air or dried-out soil | Dries back in winter or after a missed watering | Water more evenly, move it away from the radiator |
A brown tip never heals. Cut it to the shape of the leaf tip instead of straight across, and the cut barely shows.
Feeding, salts and flushing the pot
The spider plant needs less feeding than most people think. A weak dose every third to fourth month is enough, and only from March to September. Too much fertiliser burns the leaf tips and cuts the number of runners. We give Florea's fermented plant food at half strength to house plants, since the full dose is worked out for raising seedlings.
Salts from fertiliser and tap water stay behind in the soil, so flush the pot through 2 to 3 times a year. Stand it in the sink, pour lukewarm water over the surface until it runs freely from the drainage holes, let it drain for ten minutes and repeat twice. We at Florea do it in March and September.
Watering and the white root tubers
Dig into the soil of a spider plant that has stood for a couple of years and you find thick, white root tubers of 5 to 10 cm. They store water, which is why the plant survives a forgotten week without going limp. The opposite is more dangerous: root rot after too much water is the most common cause of death.
Let the top 2 to 3 cm dry out between waterings, then water right through and pour away whatever has collected in the saucer after 20 minutes. From November to February it is enough to water half as often as in summer. If the tubers are soft and greyish brown instead of firm and white, the rot has started: lift the plant, cut away the soft tubers and repot it in fresh, open soil. The basics are in the article on growing house plants.
Light and temperature
The spider plant wants a bright spot without direct midday sun. An east or west window works, as does a place 1 to 2 m into a room with a south window. Strong sun in the middle of the day bleaches the white bands and leaves dry patches. Stood too dark, the plant grows slowly, the rosette turns sparse and the runners fail to appear.
Keep 18 to 24 degrees during the day and a few degrees cooler at night. The plant takes a brief dip towards 2 degrees, but below 7 degrees growth stops. From November to January the indoor light is too weak for growth, and then a lamp helps. The advice is in the article on grow lights. A pothos is happy in the same light, but wants more even moisture.
Why your spider plant produces no runners
A spider plant without runners is almost always wrongly potted or wrongly placed, not wrongly fed. Three things have to be right.
The pot: the plant sets runners only once the roots have filled the pot. In a pot several sizes too big it spends the years on roots and leaves. Go up only 2 to 3 cm in diameter when you repot, and do it only once the roots are pushing the root ball up.
The light: too little light gives no runners at all. At the same time they form when the day has under 12 hours of light and the nights are unbroken dark for at least three weeks. A street lamp shining in at night can be enough on its own to stop them.
Age and feeding: the plant needs to be one to two years old. Fed every week, it puts its effort into leaf mass and skips the runners.
Change the pot or the place, not the fertiliser.
How to propagate from the runners
Pick the right plantlet: wait until the rosette is at least 3 cm across and you can see pale, knobbly root buds at the base.
Root it in soil with the runner still attached: stand a small pot of moist seed compost next to the mother plant, lay the rosette on the soil and pin it down with a bent paper clip. The plantlet takes water and nutrients through the stem while it roots. Cut it free once it has pushed out a new leaf, usually after 2 to 3 weeks. Our 6 cm fibre pots fit the size and can be planted out with the plant.
Root a cut plantlet in soil: cut the rosette off at the base with clean scissors or secateurs, press it down so the root buds are covered and keep it evenly moist for two weeks.
Root it in water: stand the rosette in a glass so that only the base is under the surface and the leaves stay dry. Change the water every third day and move it to soil once the roots are 3 to 4 cm.
Water is the easiest to follow, but soil gives sturdier plants. Water roots are thin and brittle and built to take up oxygen from water. Some of them die in the move to soil and the plant stands still for a few weeks. A rosette that has rooted straight into soil is spared that adjustment, and if you wait until the water roots are 10 cm the pause gets longer, not shorter.
Spider plant varieties
| Variety | Leaf marking | Habit |
|---|---|---|
| 'Vittatum' | Light green leaf with a broad white band down the middle | The one most often sold, hanging leaves, sets runners readily |
| 'Variegatum' | Dark green leaf with narrow white edges | Leaves 25 to 40 cm, stronger and more upright than 'Vittatum' |
| 'Bonnie' | White centre band as in 'Vittatum' | The leaves curl, compact plant |
| 'Mandaianum' | Dark green leaf with a yellow stripe | Dwarf variety with leaves of only 10 to 15 cm |
| Green leaved wild form | Plain green leaves without markings | Takes darker spots than the white variegated ones |
Both 'Vittatum' and 'Variegatum' hold the Award of Garden Merit from the Royal Horticultural Society. 'Vittatum' hangs more softly in a hanging pot, while 'Variegatum' stands more firmly on a shelf.
Spider plants and cats
The spider plant is harmless to cats, dogs and horses, unlike pothos, monstera and peace lily, which contain calcium oxalate. You do not need to move it out of the room if you have a cat.
Cats do like to chew on it, though. The leaves move in a draught and the runners are hard to leave alone. A cat that eats a lot of leaf may bring the plant material back up, much as after grass, and the plant is left with bitten-off leaf tips. Hang it out of reach or stand it on a shelf with no ledge below it. If the cat digs in the soil, lay a layer of cobbles or coconut fibre over the surface.
Author: Emma Vogiatzi
Fact-checked by Erik Hoekstra
Last updated 2026-09-01