Signs Your Houseplant Needs More or Less Sunlight

Written by Kelsey W.

Houseplants beautify your home with ease, with many requiring almost no maintenance beyond occasional watering, monthly feeding, and a new pot every few years.

However, sometimes your plant might be trying to tell you something. Sometimes it might be trying to tell you it’s unhappy because it’s getting too much sun or too little light.

Your plant will usually give you visual cues that will indicate its current feelings about its lighting situation. Let’s learn about some of these clues and what you should do to fix things.

The Visual Signs of Too Much Sunlight

Some houseplants will exhibit obvious signs when they’re getting too much sun. Here are the physical indicators that a plant is getting a bit too much of a suntan.

1. Crispy Feeling Leaves:

The edges of the leaves on a plant should be firm or soft, but never crispy. An over-sunned plant may have leaf edges that feel crispy and actually disintegrate when you touch them.

2. Yellow or White Leaves:

Unless a plant has naturally variegated leaves or leaves that are another color besides green, you shouldn’t see leaves turn white or yellow. These colorings may indicate an overabundance of sun.

3. Brown Leaves:

A plant may develop brown leaves for a variety of reasons, but over-sunning is definitely one of them. Brown leaves or patches of brown on the leaves may indicate scorching.

Growth Changes Due to Too Much Sun

It’s not just the appearance of the leaves that may indicate a plant has gotten too much sun. The plant might start to grow differently in an attempt to limit sun exposure. Here are some signs.

1. Reduced Growth Progress:

A plant may stop growing when it receives too much sun. If you have a houseplant that’s supposed to reach a foot tall, but it stops well short of that average, the stress of sun exposure could be the cause.

2. Curling Leaves:

A plant’s leaves may start to curl under when it gets too much sun because the curling helps reduce how much of each leaf is exposed to the sun. Curled leaves can also mean bugs, though, so it’s important to inspect the plant if you see curling leaves.

3. Wilting Plant:

A wilting plant is often a sign that it needs more water because it’s using all the water it’s given and needs more. However, the reason it’s using all its water so quickly can be the sun or the heat associated with sitting in the sunlight.

Warning Signs of Not Enough Sunlight

Just as there are physical symptoms of too much sun, the opposite is true, too. Too little sunlight can also result in physical changes to the plant. Here are a few signs that indicate your plant thinks it’s too dark.

1. Lack of Blooms:

A plant that fails to bloom might be hungry, or it might not have enough sunlight to grow flowers. If you’re feeding your plant and caring for it in all the other ways it should be cared for, check its placement. A dark corner or dim spot could mean it’s not getting enough sunlight.

2. Excessive Leaf Drop:

Plants may drop leaves naturally as a part of their growth cycle, but dropping too many leaves unexpectedly could be the result of a lack of sun. If the plant is getting good care otherwise, check the amount of sunlight it’s getting in a day.

3. Fading Leaves:

If the vibrant, bright leaves that made your plant beautiful have disappeared, low light could be the cause. Plants need sunlight to produce chlorophyll, and they can’t do that effectively without enough light. You may also see variegated plants turning into a single-color leaf when they lack sunlight.

4. Leaning Plants:

A plant will literally lean toward the sunlight when it doesn’t get enough sunlight. If you see your plant leaning in one direction or the other and the plant is otherwise sturdy enough to hold itself up, the plant could be literally stretching toward the light.

5. Leggy Stems:

You may notice a plant without enough access to sunlight looking a little strange with stems that look too long or leaves that are too far apart. This stretching is the result of the plant literally growing too quickly and stretching out in an effort to reach the sunlight.

How Long Can a Plant Live Without the Right Light?

A plant can actually live for several weeks or even months in the wrong lighting, but it’s usually much harder for low-light plants to survive in scorching sunlight than it is for sun-loving plants to survive in dim conditions for a long time.

Don’t worry if you don’t get the placement for your plant exactly right the first time you put it somewhere in your home. The plant isn’t going to perish after just a few weeks of improper placement. Simply keeping an eye on the plant and taking note when any unexpected changes occur is usually sufficient.

How to Fix a Lighting Problem with Your Plants

As is not surprising, the easiest way to fix a plant with light problems is to move it toward or away from the light, according to what it needs. As long as the plant still has some green parts on it, the plant is still alive and will slowly come back to life with the right amount of sunlight.

When moving your plant toward the sunlight after it hasn’t gotten enough for a while, you’ll want to rotate it more frequently than you might if it was healthy. Rotating it frequently will help it enjoy light on every surface around its leaves and stems.

You may also need to adjust how often you water it. If you’re moving the plant into a spot where it will receive a lot more light, you may need to increase the amount of water you give the plant. Conversely, moving the plant to a shady place might require that you cut back on watering so often.

It may also help the plant to have a few of its leggy parts or dead leaves removed, so it can focus on creating healthy growth in more pleasant growing conditions. You can usually prune dead or dying leaves off your plant; just make sure you’re not taking off too many leaves at once and leaving nothing green behind.

Finally, if you regularly fertilize your plant, you might want to hold off for a brief time while the plant recovers. Fertilizer is a great help when a plant is healthy, but it can cause unnecessary stress when a plant is already dealing with recovering from a low light or high light situation. Just hold off for a few months on fertilizing or until the plant starts to return to normal.

Avoiding Problems with Lighting Issues

The best way to avoid having a problem with the lighting surrounding your plant is to make sure you have a space that’s appropriate for that type of plant before you bring it home. If you have a snake plant, you’ll want to make sure you have a place with bright, indirect light.

On the other hand, if you have a pair of cute sun-loving succulents in a planter, you’ll want to make sure those succulents have some nice sunlight each day unless it’s a type of succulent that likes indirect light instead. Succulents like haworthia and gasteria actually tolerate low light conditions.

Understanding your plants before you bring them home or doing a study of the ones you already have on your counters and shelves can help you ensure they’re placed in the right areas around your home. Every plant has a preferred amount of light that it loves, and you can take a little time to get that just right.

Get Your Next Houseplant at Green Thumb Nursery

Are the houseplants in your home in need of some new friends? Would you like to bring a new houseplant to your home? Are you a little confused about your houseplant care and placement? Get all the information you need with a trip to one of Green Thumb Nursery’s Southern California locations.

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