Peace lilies are among the easiest houseplants to keep alive and among the hardest to keep flowering. They tolerate low light, forgive a missed watering, and tell you when they're thirsty by collapsing over the pot rim. The one thing they won't forgive is a pot left standing in water. Almost any well-drained potting mix suits them, so a general-purpose one with perlite mixed in does the job, in a container with a working drainage hole.
Brown leaf tips are the other common complaint, and five things cause them: dry air, salts building up in the pot, letting the plant dry out too far, too much direct sun, and cold damage. Dry air is the one extension guides name most often, so start by moving the plant off the radiator and flushing the pot, then look at how far it dries between waterings and how much sun it takes. Water chemistry is worth trying after that, and cold only if there was a cold spell to blame.
If you have cats or dogs, see the pet safety table for the full toxicity rundown.
Light
Bright, indirect light: an east-facing window is close to ideal. No direct sun through glass. Peace lilies are among the few foliage plants that will flower in low light at all, which is how they ended up in so many windowless offices, but a plant kept dim grows slowly and flowers less. If yours won't bloom, light and age are the two things to look at, since plants under a year old often haven't started.
Water
Water when the top inch or two (3-5 cm) of mix has dried, until it runs out of the bottom, then empty the saucer or cachepot. The pot needs a working drainage hole, and the plant must never be left standing in water. Keep the mix moist but never soggy, and water less in winter, when the plant is using less. If it collapses over the pot rim, feel the mix before you reach for the watering can: a droop on damp soil is usually a root problem, and watering it again makes it worse. The exception is a bright, hot afternoon above about 85°F (29°C), where a plant on moist mix may sag and recover on its own by evening.
Humidity
Average room humidity is workable, and sources differ on whether peace lilies want more than that. Where they agree is on placement: keep it clear of radiators and forced-air vents, since hot, cold or drafty spots damage the plant. Dry air is one of several causes of browning leaf tips, so if a room stays dry all winter, grouping plants together or running a humidifier does more than misting.
Temperature
Warm, with a night drop of 5 to 10°F (3-6°C). US extension guidance puts the day range at 68-85°F (20-29°C); the RHS caps it lower, at 75°F (24°C), so treat the upper end as tolerated rather than ideal. On the cold side, most sources set the floor at 55°F (13°C) and the more cautious at 60°F (16°C). Cold does real damage well above freezing, and a spell in a cold car or against a winter windowpane shows up as blackened leaf tips and edges.
Fertilizing
A light feeder that burns easily. Balanced liquid fertilizer such as 20-20-20 at a quarter of the label strength, every six to eight weeks through spring and summer. Skip winter. Feed into mix that's already damp, never dry. Overfeeding scorches the leaf tips and the roots, so if you're unsure, feed less. If a white crust builds up on the soil or the pot rim, scrape it off and flush the pot through with several times its volume of plain water.
Pruning
A white spathe fading to green and then brown is just the flower aging. Once one has gone brown, cut its stalk right down at the base where it leaves the crown, not partway up. Take fully yellowed or browned leaves off at the base too. Those broad glossy leaves collect dust, so wipe them with a damp cloth now and then. The RHS advises gloves on the grounds that the sap can irritate skin, though not every source agrees it does.
Toxicity to pets
Toxic to cats and dogs (insoluble calcium oxalates). Chewing causes burning in the mouth, drooling, vomiting and difficulty swallowing. It is not a true lily, so it doesn't carry the kidney-failure risk that Lilium species pose to cats.
Common questions
Why did my peace lily flower when I bought it and never again?
Because the nursery made it flower. Commercial growers spray peace lilies with gibberellic acid, a plant hormone that triggers flower buds and brings blooms roughly two to four months later, which is how a young plant arrives in full flower well before it would have managed alone. Left to itself, a peace lily flowers once a year, in late winter or early spring, and only once it's mature and getting enough light. Move it somewhere brighter and be patient. The hormone is sold to home growers, but it's worth skipping: growers test it cultivar by cultivar because the wrong dose distorts the blooms and pushes out narrow, strappy leaves, and it isn't legal to apply everywhere.
Do peace lilies clean the air?
Not in any way you'd notice. The claim traces back to a 1989 NASA experiment that sealed plants, peace lilies among them, in airtight chambers at chemical concentrations far above anything in a house. Later work found the effect doesn't survive contact with a real room: to match the amount of air an ordinary building already exchanges with outdoors, you would need somewhere between 10 and 1,000 plants per square meter of floor. Keep the plant because it looks good.
How often does a peace lily need repotting?
Go by the roots, not the calendar. The signs to repot are roots coming out of the drainage holes or circling on top of the mix. Peace lilies like to be slightly pot-bound and rot less that way, so there's nothing to gain from moving one early. Go up a single size when you do, since surplus mix the roots can't reach stays wet and invites root rot. A pot that dries out within a day or two of a thorough watering is the practical sign it's overdue.
How do I propagate a peace lily?
By division. Tip the plant out in spring, tease or cut the established clump into sections, and pot each one up separately, making sure every section has plenty of roots and several strong stems of its own. Don't expect a leaf or a cut stalk to root the way a pothos cutting would: a peace lily grows from a rhizome at the base and its leaves rise on stalks straight out of it, so there's no node on the stalk to root from. Nurseries do raise them from seed and tissue culture, but neither is a kitchen-counter job.
Is tap water bad for peace lilies?
It's usually fine. The RHS warns that fluoride in tap water can mark the foliage, though the US extension guides on this species don't raise it and mostly list other plants as the fluoride-sensitive ones. Either way it's the last thing to try, not the first: if the tips keep browning after you've flushed the pot and cut back the feeding, switch to rainwater or distilled and see. Softened water is the one to avoid outright, since it adds sodium and chloride to the mix.
Related articles
Why is my peace lily drooping?
A peace lily that collapses over the pot rim is usually thirsty, and stands back up within hours of a proper watering. If it doesn't, the problem is in the roots, and the fix is nothing like watering.
Overwatered or underwatered? How to tell the difference
Both look like a drooping, yellowing plant — but the fixes are opposites. Four checks that tell you which problem you actually have.
This guide was researched and written with AI assistance and reviewed by a human editor before publishing. How we use AI