10” Ficus Tineke, 36” inch tall, Rubber Plant deals

Ficus Elastica, Rubber Plant

Light
Grow away from continuous direct sunlight. Instead give your Rubber Plant a well lit spot with some indirect sun if possible.

The all green types will take some shade and poorly lit spaces, but too much for too long and the plant will become lanky and spindly.

If you have a variegated type you must provide bright indirect light, otherwise If you opt for shade, you'll lose the markings.

Watering
The Rubber Plant watering needs are simple - they love a good soaking when they're growing, but dislike constantly damp roots. We've found the best way to treat them is to water your plant really well once the soil surface and top inch has dried out, then wait until it dries out in the same way before watering again.

If you're watering more than once a week the Ourhouseplants.com Team are looking your way with narrowed eyes, questioning your technique. This might work for you and if it does keep doing it, but in most homes watering more than once a week is likely too frequent.

You shouldn't let a Rubber Plant sit in water, so after 30 minutes if there's still water remaining in the drip tray, pour it away. In Winter scale back and avoid the soaking, instead aim to keep the soil just moist, but remember to still let the soil dry out before coming back with the watering can.

Humidity
You can mist the leaves from time to time when the air is very dry, but really you don't need to worry about humidity levels.

Feeding
To produce those massive leaves the Rubber Plant needs feeding. Little and often is best, a weak balanced feed every couple of watering's during Spring and Summer.

Rubber Plant with red leaf sheath, photo by Madison Inouye
As with usual feeding rules, don't fertilise in Winter, or recently repotted and new plants for a good 3 to deals 6 months.

If your plant's not producing new leaves don't feed at all.

Temperature
The Rubber Plant will be quite happy to grow in a broad range of temperatures between 10°C (50°F) to 29°C (85°F).

If you go hotter, the leaves will lose some of their turgid appearance. You can go as low as 4°C (39°F) in Winter if you have to, but your watering must be spot on. If you've overwatered at this temperature you'll kill the plant quickly!

Repotting
These plants grow quite big even if their pots are tiny.

These plants grow quite big even if their pots are tiny. However there will still come a point where the growth will slow down or even stop. You then have two choices, either leave it where it is and top dress instead.

Topdressing means scraping off the top inch or so of old soil and replacing with fresh compost which introduces fresh nutrients and beneficial microbes back into the old tired potting soil.

The second choice is to repot. Repotting a Rubber Plant is quite easy if it's not to heavy. All you need to do is move it into a bigger pot using a standard potting mix. If you're new to houseplants we have a more extensive repotting guide just for you.