Several off-white flowers growing on dark green branches

Jasminum officinale

Common jasmine

Family: Oleaceae

Other common names: ياسمين شائع, ياسمين شامي, ياسمين صيفي (Arabic), jasmín pravý (Czech), jasmin officinal (French), Ίασμος ο φαρμακευτικός, Κοινό Γιασεμί (Greek), gelsomino commune (Italian), ソケイ(Japanese), Жасмин лекарственный (Russian), jazmín común, estrellita (Spanish)

Plant description

Common jasmine is a climbing shrub that can grow up to 8 metres tall. The leaves are made up of 7 to 9 smaller ‘leaflets’, which are long, pointed and oval-shaped. The flowers are white or very pale pink, with five petals and strongly scented. The fruits are small black berries.

Read the scientific profile for common jasmine.

A pair of small white flowers on green branches — Common jasmine (Jasminum officinale) flowers, Dinesh Valke on Wikimedia Commons CC BY SA 2.0

Long green oval shaped leaves — Common jasmine (Jasminum officinale) leaves, David J. Stang on Wikimedia Commons CC BY SA 4.0

White jasmine flowers — Common jasmine (Jasminum officinale) flowers, John Robert McPherson on Wikimedia Commons CC BY SA 4.0

Plant uses

Beauty and cosmetics

Jasmine oil is commonly used in various scented products like soaps and perfumes due to its strong fragrant scent.

Cultural

Jasmine is the national flower of Pakistan, and features on the state emblem.

Jasmine is used in aromatherapy, although there is limited clinical evidence to support its effectiveness.

Did you know?

Jasmine gets its genus name, Jasminum, from the Persian yasmin, which was the name of a perfume potentially made from the flower.
The species name, officinale, (meaning ‘of an officina’, the store room of a monastery), was used by Carl Linnaeus to describe species that had a known culinary or medicinal use.

Where in the world?

A map of the world showing where jasmine is native and introduced to

Native: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China South-Central, East Himalaya, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Tadzhikistan, Tibet, Turkey, West Himalaya

Introduced: Algeria, Bulgaria, Cuba, Dominican Republic, France, Great Britain, Haiti, Italy, Leeward Is., Portugal, Puerto Rico, Romania, Venezuelan Antilles, Yugoslavia

Habitat:

Grows in a range of temperate habitats