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If you give your Monstera deliciosa a lot of light, humidity, and ample warmth, you can get new leaves every couple of weeks.
Monsteras that are given more standard care grow much more slowly.
Monstera Deliciosa grows pretty quickly in general if you provide them with the right conditions.
This is great for those of you on a budget because it means that rather than spending £70 on a big one, you can buy a little one and wait.
If (and it’s a big if) you’re prepared to nurture it.
But, if you do everything properly, your monstera should have no problem producing new leaves on a monthly basis – more, if your plant is big enough to have multiple points of growth.
But the frequency with which your monstera grows new leaves isn’t something the plant controls.
You control that.
The plant just sits there, doing its best (which it will do – a plant will grow as big as it possibly can, given the opportunity).
It’s up to you to provide food, water, humidity, and light to enable it to grow. The bigger it gets, the more leaves it’ll be able to produce at once.
If your plant can grow one leaf per growth point per month, then the more growth points the plant has, the more leaves it can produce.
You can sometimes convince plants to start another growth point, but we’ll get into that later in the article.
This is a pretty in-depth article about coaxing monstera deliciosa to grow quickly. If you want more of a quick guide about general care, I have an article on that here.
Each of these individual care tips will help speed up your Monstera’s rate of growth, but if you combine them all, it’ll grow so fast you’ll be living in a jungle within weeks.
This is the single biggest thing you can do to make your plant grow faster.
Monstera are not plants that will thrive in low light.
They just tell you that so they can sell them.
Your monstera needs light to create energy to grow. In that respect, the more light the better.
However, as you probably know, the sun is pretty hot, and it burns you.
Monstera will also burn.
There are two route you can go down – the proper one and the lazy one.
The proper way is spend the time acclimating your Monstera by moving it into brighter light gradually over a few weeks.
The lazy way (which I much prefer because I’m a monster) is to whack it outside, burn every leaf to crisp, remove them, and then wait for the new growth to come in.
Plants produce various pigments to deal with various issues, and if they detect that they may need a bit of sunscreen, they’ll produce more carotenoids*.
*This is laymen’s terms. I’m making botanists very angry right now.
If you have a variegated Monstera, the white portions are more prone to burn, but mine is in a south-facing window and she’s doing great.
Grow lights can really, really speed up growth – and are less likely to burn your variegated Monstera.
I love this MarsHydro light – it really speeds up plant growth BUT it’s a professional grow light so it needs to be suspended, which can be a pain if you don’t want to put a hook in your ceiling. Mine is currently set up like this:
Obvs my Monsteras are not underneath it, because they don’t fit.
Grow lights don’t just produce light, they produce a bit of warmth as well, which can speed up growth, and help them grow year-round.
All lights are not produced equal – grow lights are much brighter than standard LED bulbs, but normal LED lights can provide a bit of extra energy for plants and help them grow.
But if you have your plant in a dark corner with a normal light, don’t expect quick growth. It’ll probably be 100% fine, just able to thrive as much as it could. You could always get a grow bulb though.
Increasing the light can also make your Monstera grow bushier.
If light is abundant, the internodal spacing is smaller. It’s quite hard to see on my Monstera so I’ll demonstrate on a schefflera:
See how the gaps between the nodes at the bottom are bigger? That’s due to the plant being in a lower light environment.
More light means a smaller internodal space, which means that the plant looks bushier. It also makes them WAY easier to stake and they look neater in general.
A large internodal space is what plant people mean when they call a plant leggy. It happens when plants stretch towards the light.
Monstera like to drink a LOT of water, but like most plants, overwatering will lead to root rot.
I know a lot of people would love a plant watering schedule, but let me be clear: we’re on the monstera’s watering schedule; it won’t adhere to ours.
If you’re on a mission to grow your plant super quickly, check the soil fairly often. Water it thoroughly when it’s almost dry.
This is the moisture probe I recommend. It’s super cheap from Amazon and doesn’t need batteries.
Accidentally letting your Monstera totally dry out will not kill it (unless you do it a lot), but it will put the plant in survival mode, so all of the plant’s energy will focus solely on staying alive.
Things like growing new leaves and aerial roots will be put on the back burner.
This is the second most important thing that will dramatically increase how fast your Monstera will grow, after increasing the light.
So why put it third, below watering?
Because you can control how often you water your plant will little additional financial burden.
There’s not a lot you can do about increasing humidity, short of forking out for a humidifier.
Monstera are perfectly happy to survive in normal room humidity, which is usually around 40%.
If you have designs on growing an enormous Monstera (a monster Monstera if you will, lol, lol, lol) then 40% won’t get you there in a hurry.
If you don’t know what your humidity is, get yourself a hygrometer from Amazon. It comes with a battery and displays the humidity and temperature. They’re pretty cheap.
65% humidity is…great. Very good.
But get up to the 80s and you can get serious growth.
If you’re committing to getting your monstera to chuck out more leaves, and your humidity is under 60%, I’d advise you to get a humidifier. Misting can spread disease and fungus, and pebble trays are…fine, but neither are gonna get your humidity high enough.
The humidifier I recommend is the Levoit one. It’s recommended by a lot of plant care gurus for a couple of reasons:
And just think, you can make the money you spent on the humidifier back by selling Monstera cuttings.
Realistically, you’re not going to want to live in 80% humidity. 65% is more likely BUT I just want you to know that super high humidity is the key to fast growth. If you want to grow a baby Monstera quickly, putting it in a terrarium is a great way to do that.
Terrariums (or cloches) are an easy way to create a high-humidity environment. You can even keep the plant in their nursery pot to make it easier to take them out when they (inevitably) outgrow it.
Use moss or coir as a substrate and keep the humidity high by spraying down the coir every day. It’s easy to get humidity into the 90s.
Keeping your monstera dust-free is one of the least sexy ways of convincing your monstera to put out more leaves.
It is free though!
This is the time you can crack out that pretty mister you bought – although I’ve never found a pretty one. I use amber glass spray bottles because I love functional decor.
I used to use diluted neem oil and washing up liquid, but now I like to use an orchid foliar spray. Both are fine. I have no idea which is better, but the foliar spray smells nicer.
Spray your plant liberally, and then wipe each leaf with a cloth or kitchen towel.
I also dust my plants with a makeup eraser cloth – they are SO GOOD for dusting plants.
Using the neem oil or castile soap spray deters pests and kills any that might be hanging around. Other pest control methods I employ are keeping spiders on my plants to eat bugs. It works like a charm if you can get them to stay.
I have a whole post on fertilising plants here, but over fertilising can do more harm than good, so stick to using a gentle general purpose monthly, diluted to half the strength the manufacturer recommends.
Always fertilise moist soil, so water first if the soil is super dry, then water in your fertiliser.
Alternatively, you can add worm castings to your potting mix, for a gentle, natural fertiliser.
I use the General Hydroponics Flora series to fertilise my Monstera, because it’s good for leca and soil.
Yes, it is more of a ballache to prepare than other fertilisers, thanks for asking. But it doesn’t smell and seems to work.
The Monsteras that live in the aquarium are fertilised by fish poop only. They seem to do ok!
Monstera don’t like to have too big a pot (though they can tolerate a lot of room better than most other plants), but they do grow large root systems quickly.
To check if your Monstera needs repotting, check its roots.
Roots protruding from the drainage holes is sometimes a sign, although if you bottom water you can find that some plants grow roots straight down to get to the water.
Hence why you shouldn’t let plants sit in water, since it encourages roots to grow down.
If the roots are growing in a circle around the outside of the soil, it’s best to repot. I like to keep Monstera Deliciosa in terracotta pots because they naturally semi-epiphytic (they don’t necessarily root in the ground) and like a lot of soil aeration.
It’s perfectly fine to keep your monstera in regular house plant potting mix, with a bit of added perlite or orchid bark for aeration. However, if you make your own (I have a recipe on this post) it can encourage the roots to grow stronger because they have to work harder to keep the plant upright.
I honestly think Monstera dgaf when it comes to potting medium.
I kept my Monstera in a terracotta pot for YEARS. It…didn’t like it.
Now it’s in a plastic nursery pot and is waaaay happier and growing faster.
If you’re a bit of an overwaterer, terracotta is GREAT. It dries out incredibly quickly, so you’re less likely to end up with root rot. BUT if you have a tendency towards underwatering, or have suffered from plant ennui* in the past, then consider using something that will retain more water.
*Anyone that has ADHD or experienced depression will know the guilt that comes from accidentally neglecting your plants. Terracotta is your enemy here.
I thought I’d just mention this, since variegated monstera are somewhat, ahem, pricey, that they don’t tend to grow as quickly as green Monstera.
The reason for this is, I assume, that they don’t have as much chlorophyll with which to photosynthesise, so they have can create less energy.
That being said, these tips will help increase the speed of growth, even if it still doesn’t grow that quickly.
My Thai Constellation goes through phases of producing loads of leaves and then…none.
I’ve also noticed that Thais are more prone to root rot than regular green Monstera and Albos. I assume there’s a glitchy gene somewhere in there. Mine has thrived in the aquarium, and many people swear by putting them in leca. If you prefer soil, I’d recommend keeping it in a clear pot (so you can see the roots) with a nice, airy potting mix.
Yes, but unless you give it an abundance of resources (light, humidity, water, food), it probably won’t.
A Monstera that’s surviving won’t grow. A Monstera that’s thriving will grow quickly.
Again, this is simple but not easy.
Here in the UK, you’ll probably need a terrarium to get multiple growth points.
As far as I’m aware each node on the Monstera can only produce one leaf BUT you may notice that there are some nodes with no leaf. Monstera tend to grow a lot of nodes, that’s…just what vining plants do.
As I mentioned before, my Monstera is waaaay too big to be in my terrarium (for now! I need a bigger one) but my RT is THRIVING:
I’ve circled the new growth pointsLOOK AT HER GO
Apologies to people who are feeling queasy at the sight of those aerial roots. That’s what they look like in 90% humidity.
As you can see, rhapidophora can clearly have multiple leaves per node (unless the nodes are extremely close together), but I’m assured Monstera deliciosa can’t. If anyone knows differently please let me know!
For comparison, my RT outside of the terrarium grows pretty slowly. This thing grows like a weed.
So, that covers the ways we can grow Monstera faster, but what about growing them bigger?
The good news is that Monstera grow bigger leaves as they mature, and hopefully, you’ll get those gorgeous splits and fenestrations as you go along.
Here are a few additional tips to help your Monstera leaves grow BIG.
So if you’re after a big plant quickly, stake it up rather than propagating it. A lot of vining plants create bigger leaves when they climb upwards because…
...ok pretend you're a plant. Why are you climbing up a tree? To reach the sun (the sun is always up, for there are no ceilings in the rainforest). With more light (from the sun you're climbing towards) you can grow bigger leaves and use those to capture even more light to make more leaves.
So if you allow your monstera to climb, it’ll grow bigger leaves.
Plants don’t seem to know the sun can’t penetrate through the roof of your house. If you grow them upwards even without increasing the light, they grow bigger leaves.
Some plants, like pothos, are almost always photographed and sold in their immature form. Only by growing them upwards do they start growing mature leaves – with splits in the leaves and everything.
Can’t afford a variegated Monstera? Cheat! Get yourself a Marble queen Pothos, grow it up a stake, give it a TONNE of light and humidity (I didn’t say it would be easy!) and it will, over time, start putting out huge leaves with splits in them.
this is a golden Pothos, not a MonsteraIt can be as easy as zip-tying one of these bad boys:
…but that’s not the easiest way.
You see, these moss poles are a PAIN to keep moist. And if you want the plant to attach by itself, you either need REALLY high humidity (if you want to see some pictures of what high humidity does to aerial roots, take a look at this article) or to keep the coir consistently moist.
It’s really hard to keep these poles damp without also keeping everything in the immediate vicinity damp too.
I like a moss pole that you can keep damp more easily. Check out this video if you want to make a homemade one.
You can also buy something similar from Amazon.
You can also use a plank of wood (you’ll have to treat the bottom or you could end up with it rotting). This is a great option if you cba watering a moss pole.
There’s no trick here – just attach the stem (not the petioles, which are the bits that attach the leaves to the stem) to the moss pole.
I like to use plant ties (which are basically plant ties) or rubberised garden wire. You can also use zip ties. Don’t use string or twine that can cut into the plant’s stem.
You may have to cut bits off (or do what I do, which is have it look a little wild) to make it into a shape you like, but with the tips above you can easily restore it to its former glory.
If you’re using a plank of wood, use tape. Nothing too strong, just regular tape.
they’re happy to climb up a wallIt may take a while, but as long as you keep the moss pole damp, the aerial roots should eventually attach to the moss pole.
You don’t need to dampen the plank, the aerial roots should just attach by themselves.
High humidity is the key to success here. If you have low humidity, you may struggle to get the roots to attach.
This is a loaded question and it doesn’t exactly have a straightforward answer.
Monstera are easy to keep alive. In fact, unless you’re overwatering it or keeping it somewhere that’s too cold for a long time, they’re pretty hard to kill.
Like, really hard to kill.
Monstera are simple to grow huge and fast BUT you need the correct conditions. All the light and humidity you can throw at it, and plenty of food and water. Simple, but not exactly easy in darkest North Yorkshire in the middle of winter.
I have a whole article all about Monstera propagation here.
Yes, they’re SUPER easy to propagate. You can make another plant by taking a cutting here:
Then either stick the plant in soil or water.
Propagating a plant and then putting the cutting in with the mother plant is a great way of making plants look fuller.
You absolutely can do this with monstera but those things have HELLISH roots, so prepare to buy some big-ass pots. I prefer to keep my monstera separately, and only propagate if I want a separate plant.
Monstera are one of the few plants I recommend propping in soil.
I’m an underwaterer by nature, so a lot of my soil propagations end up drying out way too quickly and, er, dying.
If this sounds like you, try propagating in leca – it’s by far the best way for lazy people to propagate plants.
For those of you struggling to propagate your Monstera, I have a troubleshooting guide here.
The general ballpark figure we’re looking at when people ask how quickly Monstera put out new leaves is monthly BUT it depends so much on the care you provide that it’s hard to say.
Some plants might only put out a couple of leaves a year, some might produce a new one every couple of weeks.
The two most important things to increase are humidity and light.
As well as growing bigger, the plant will also grow stronger (think of humidity and light being the equivalent to a human eating a healthy, balanced diet, and doing plenty of exercise) and be able to better fight off pests and diseases.
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