Plants are multicellular eukaryotes that make their own food by photosynthesis. The kingdom tells the story of life moving onto land — from simple mosses up to the flowering plants that dominate the world today.
Members of Plantae are multicellular, eukaryotic autotrophs: they photosynthesise using chloroplasts. Their cells have cellulose cell walls and a large central vacuole. Adaptations for life on land include a waxy cuticle, stomata, and (in most) vascular tissue (xylem and phloem).
The groups form a rough ladder of increasing adaptation to dry land:
| Group | Examples | Key features |
|---|---|---|
| Bryophytes | Mosses, liverworts | Non-vascular; small; no true roots (rhizoids); need water to reproduce |
| Pteridophytes | Ferns | Vascular; true roots, stems, leaves; reproduce by spores |
| Gymnosperms | Pine, conifers | Vascular; seeds exposed on cones (no flowers/fruit) |
| Angiosperms | Flowering plants | Vascular; flowers; seeds enclosed in fruit; most diverse |
Angiosperms are split into monocots (one seed leaf, parallel veins — e.g. grasses, wheat) and dicots (two seed leaves, net veins — e.g. mango, beans).
Plants have a life cycle that alternates between two forms:
Gametes fuse to make a diploid sporophyte; the sporophyte makes spores that grow into gametophytes — and so on. In mosses the gametophyte is dominant; in ferns and seed plants the sporophyte (the plant we usually see) is dominant.
Seeds protect and feed the young plant and don't need water for fertilisation (pollen carries the male cells). Flowers and fruits attract animals to pollinate and to disperse seeds — which is why angiosperms became the most successful land plants.