Grow indoor jade plants to brighten your home — they are great in the garden, too!
Jade plants can brighten up any home or garden and they barely need looking after. Let us take you through our favorite jade plants in pictures, and you’ll find out how easy it is to grow them. We share our top tips for growing jade plants indoors and outdoors. First off though…
Jade Plants — uhmm, What Are They?
Jades are succulents: plants that have adapted to deal with hot dry conditions. You’ll recognize them as a common houseplant, but you may not know how many different varieties you can get, of all shapes and colors.
Their plump rubbery leaves store water, which makes them ideal indoor plants. They rarely need to drink, barely need pruning and will grow happily in most conditions.
15 Different Types of Jade Plants With Pictures
Many of us have seen indoor jade plants, growing in small pots – but they can get really big with more room, and even grow into small trees. Check out the size of our first choice below.
Read on for our top 15. These jade plants and their Crassula relatives are just perfect for gardening beginners.
1. Crassula Ovata (Also Known as Crassula Argentea, Crassula Portulacea)
- Common name: Jade plant, friendship plant, money plant
- Height: Can grow to over 6ft in a big pot
Over time this classic houseplant can get to a grand old size if it has enough space — check this one out above! It’s probably over 20 years old, so they don’t grow this big overnight.
The original jade plant is popular because it’s evergreen, it grows indoors with little to no attention, and it looks pretty cool too. You may get the small white and pink flowers towards the end of summer, although jade plants are not always known for their flowering capabilities.
2. Crassula Ovata ‘Gollum’
- Common name: Gollum jade plant
- Height: 4ft is possible
This is a cultivar of Crassula ovata, as most on this list of Crassulas are. The leaves look like tubes, but they aren’t hollow. Sometimes this one is called ‘trumpet jade’, ‘ET’s fingers’, and even ‘Shrek’s ears’ – it’s not hard to see why!
There is some confusion over whether the Gollum jade is distinct from the Hobbit jade. They look very similar, but we gather there are slight differences. Hobbit is less tubey apparently.
3. Crassula x Rupestris f. Marnieriana ‘Hottentot’
- Common name: Jade necklace, baby’s necklace, bead vine
- Height: can reach 3ft if allowed
These are pretty crazy, aren’t they? To us, they look a bit like stretched miniature squeezeboxes. Cool. They are good if you want something that grows over the edges of pots, as they have a trailing habit. A hanging basket or container could be an ideal spot. Crassula rupestris produces white star-shaped flowers in clusters.
4. Crassula Ovata ‘Hummel’s Sunset’
- Common name: Jade plant ‘Hummel’s Sunset’ or simply ‘Sunset’
- Height: about 3ft
This jade plant has a great look. The red and yellow tints make it stand out amongst other jades, and growing them vertically like in the picture above looks impressive when you’ve got a mixture of different plants. They have the wow factor and need next-to-no care. What’s not to love? Of all the types of jade plants this is one of our top choices.
5. Crassula Arborescens
- Common name: Silver jade plant, silver dollar plant
- Height: Up to 4ft
Crassula arborescens has eye-catching silvery-green round leaves with red edges. If you combine this with other jade plants in our list – such as Hummel’s Sunset above – you’ll get some fantastic color contrasts. This will make the plants stand out on a living wall or bring some added variety to your collection of indoor jade plants.
6. Crassula Ovata Variegata or ‘Tricolor’
- Common name: Variegated jade plant, Tricolor jade, lemon and lime
- Height: 1ft
A pale green-and-white striped version of the original jade plant. These make a nice contrast with darker green jades. They will sometimes turn a pinkish hue at the tips of the leaves if they get plenty of sun.
White flowers blossom on fast-growing branches. Grow with red-orange Hummel’s Sunset and the silvery-grey of Crassula arborescens for a stunning pop of color.
7. Crassula Ovata ‘Crosby’s Compact’
- Common name: Dwarf jade plant, Crosby’s dwarf
- Height: Stays small: 6-12 inches
Not to be confused with Portulacaria afra. That’s also known as dwarf jade but it’s a different plant altogether called Elephant’s Bush (yep, elephants eat it). The branches and leaves of Crosby’s Compact are smaller than your average jade plant. It makes a good indoor plant for a windowsill, as you know it’s not going to grow into a beast. The yellow-green leaves turn reddish the more direct sun they get.
8. Crassula Ovata ‘Minima’
- Common name: Small jade, baby jade, miniature jade
- Height: 2.5ft
This grows into the cutest miniature jade tree. The leaves are greenish-yellow with red tints, like many jade plants. It has quite a thick trunk once it gets growing. The flowers are tiny and coral pink. Another perfect choice for an indoors jade plant or as a feature plant on your patio.
9. Crassula Ovata ’Obliqua’
- Common name: Jade plant, dollar plant
- Height: Over 1ft
Slightly different from the original Crassula ovata with its pointy leaves. The leaves on Obliqua seem to grow in a more upright fashion too. The flowers can be pink or white and appear in the winter and early spring. Sometimes the leaves turn a lovely purple color at the edges on this jade plant.
10. Crassula ovata ‘Pink Beauty’
- Common name: Pink jade plant, Pink Beauty jade plant
- Height: up to 5ft
This jade plant is known for its frothy pink flowers which appear in early to mid-winter. Jade plants are known more for their leaves and branches than for their floral displays, but this one is an exception. It makes an attractive addition to your backyard or home, and the flowers smell lovely too.
11. Crassula Ciliata
- Common name: Crassula ciliata
- Height: up to 12 inches
This plant has a lovely soft velvety coating to its leaves. It’s quite a fast developer and tends to like growing vertically rather than sideways. The flowers are creamy yellow. Like many jade plants and their relatives, this succulent can be grown in the garden – it would look admirable in any rock garden.
12. Crassula Ovata ‘Skinny fingers’
- Common name: Finger jade, organ pipe jade plant
- Height: 3ft
This Crassula is very similar to the Gollum and Hobbit jade plants, with long finger-like leaves that look red at the tips. These fingers can grow to about two inches long. If you like your plants to look like body parts this could be the perfect fit for you! Like most of the jade plants, ‘Skinny fingers’ has small white-pink flowers.
13. Crassula Ovata ‘Undulata’
- Common name: Curly jade plant, undulata jade plant, Crassula curly
- Height: up to 2ft
Blue-green wavy leaves are the signature of this jade plant. We just love the look of this curly succulent. If allowed to grow it can eventually get quite tree-like, as with other jades, and will get to about 2 feet tall if allowed to develop.
14. Crassula Capitella or Erosula ‘Campfire’
- Common name: Campfire crassula
- Height: up to 1ft and 3ft wide
An explosion of color for your home or garden, this Crassula lives up to its name with fire-red to orange leaves. This one likes to grow sideways into a mat, so it would be great outdoors as ground cover in a rockery. It has white clusters of flowers in the summer. A stunning succulent.
15. Crassula Perforata
- Common name: String of buttons, necklace vine, pagoda plant
- Height: 18 inches
This plant has the same cute habit of stacking and winding its triangular leaves as the baby’s necklace jade plant we covered earlier. String of buttons has grey-green leaves which may look pinkish and can go very red with a lot of sun, like the variegated version pictured above. The flowers are yellow.
Jade Plants And Other Crassulas
Many different Crassula species have been cultivated from the classic jade plant Crassula ovata, as you’ll see below. We’ve picked some other Crassula succulents too which we think you’ll find pretty cool for your containers.
Caring For Jade Plants — Top Tips
- They don’t like extremes of heat – not too hot, not too cold
- Terracotta pots help keep their roots well-aired
- They are happy in small pots with a potting mix designed for cacti
- 5-6 hours of light a day for your indoor jade plants, but they grow in partial shade
- Position your plants so they get the morning sun
- If you get lots of leggy branches snip them off to keep the shape tidy
- Don’t stand jade plants in trays of water – let the soil dry out between waterings
Loving these succulents? Check out 19 types of aloe plants with pictures for more ideas.