The Plant List — A working list for all plant species

⚠ Version 1 of The Plant List has been superseded.

You should refer instead to the current version of The Plant List.

The Gymnosperms (Conifers, cycads and allies)

Welwitschia mirabilis Hook.f.

Gymnosperms are seed-bearing vascular plants, such as cycads, ginkgo, yews and conifers, in which the ovules or seeds are not enclosed in an ovary. The word "gymnosperm" comes from the Greek word gymnospermos, meaning "naked seeds". Gymnosperm seeds develop either on the surface of scale or leaf-like appendages of cones, or at the end of short stalks.

The largest group of living gymnosperms are the conifers (pines, cypresses and relatives) and the smallest is ginkgo, a single living plant species found in China.

There are around 1000 species of gymnosperm.

You can also browse genera found in Gymnosperms.

View statistics at the bottom of the page.

Families in Gymnosperms

Statistics

Species of Gymnosperms contained within The Plant List belong to 14 plant families and 88 plant genera.

The Plant List includes 4,588 scientific plant names of species rank for the Gymnosperms. Of these 1,088 are accepted species names.

The Plant List includes a further 2,772 scientific plant names of infraspecific rank for the Gymnosperms. We do not intend The Plant List to be complete for names of infraspecific rank. These are primarily included because names of species rank are synonyms of accepted infraspecific names.

Species names

The status of the 4,588 species names for the Gymnosperms recorded in The Plant List, are as follows:

Status Total
Accepted 1,088 23.7%
Synonym 3,290 71.7%
Unplaced 55 1.2%
Unassessed 155 3.4%

All names

The status of the 7,360 names (including infraspecific names) for the Gymnosperms recorded in The Plant List, are as follows:

Status Total
Accepted 1,303 17.7%
Synonym 5,809 78.9%
Unplaced 55 0.7%
Unassessed 193 2.6%

Of these names,

A further 9 name records indicate where names have been misapplied.

The confidence with which the status of the 4,588 species names recorded in The Plant List for the Gymnosperms, are assigned as follows:

Confidence level Accepted Synonym Unplaced Unassessed Total
High confidence 1,055 2,999 0 0 4,054 88.4%
Medium confidence 17 159 0 0 176 3.8%
Low confidence 16 132 55 155 358 7.8%

The source of the species name record found in The Plant List for the Gymnosperms, are as follows:

Source of record Accepted Synonym Unplaced Unassessed Misapplied Total
Tropicos 17 166 0 93 0 276 6.0%
WCSP 1,071 3,124 55 40 9 4,299 93.7%
WCSP (in review) 0 0 0 22 0 22 0.5%