4 Possible Cause of a Peace Lily with Yellow Leaves (Plus the Fixes)

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Oh, the problems of the peace lily. Yellow leaves turn black, brown spots appear, and leaves wilt because you can’t get them to drink enough water.

Or, at least that’s what you think the problem is. There are actually a few things that contribute to the leaves of peace lilies turning yellow and paling in color before that.

Spot the paling leaves early enough, and you can rectify the problems before the leaves turn yellow. If you don’t, they’ll need trimming because they’ll never regain their dark green foliage.

Gardeners make it appear so easy to grow the gorgeous peace lily as a houseplant. You try and what happens? All sorts of problems start appearing! 

I’m here to help you keep those issues to a minimum.

How to Care for an Indoor Peace Lily to Reduce Yellow Leaves

The natural leaf color should be a dark green shade. The instant the dark green color fades is when to start looking at what’s going wrong with the growing conditions.

Possible causes of yellowing leaves on a peace lily grown indoors include:

1. Sunburn

Peace lilies don’t need much direct sunlight to grow, faring pretty well in shady spots. Too much direct sunlight burns the leaves and causes them to turn yellow.

Peace lily + yellow leaves = sunburn.

If you leave the plant in the same stressful growing climate, the problem might get worse. You might end up with wilting/drooping leaves until they eventually just drop off the plant—dead.

2 – Soil Problems

To grow a peace lily as a houseplant, the soil needs to be moist and well-draining at the same time.

Win the watering battle by feeding your peace lily when it tells you it needs a drink. Generally, you only need to water it once a week and when that time comes, the leaves will sag slightly.

They won’t be terribly wilted but will have a slight sag on them, and that’s when they need a drink. Just as they’re beginning to droop (see some other causes of drooping).

Pay attention to how often your plant wilts because if it happens every three to four days, chances are, it needs a bigger pot. But, check the drainage holes of the pot first; those can get clogged, causing the plant to be sitting in standing water.

When watering the soil, pour the water into the soil until you see it pour out of the drainage holes. That’s enough to keep the soil moist for up to a week.

3 – Water Quality Issues

If your watering frequency isn’t the problem, it can be the type of water you use. Tap water, as you may know, has many additives in it, and a lot of those aren’t suitable for plants (or human consumption).

That’s why I always use filtered water for peace lilies. Otherwise, they might let you know they don’t like the water by throwing a hissy fit and turning all shades of the wrong colors!

The main concern with tap water is calcium. Too much will cause leaf discoloration including yellowing, brown spots, and, in the worst case, blackening of the leaves.

If your peace lily’s leaves have brown spots, check the base of the plant pot drainage holes for white speckles. These are mineral deposits from harsh water chemicals.

To get rid of the mineral buildup, use bottled water to flush the soil. Then, trim the ruined leaves and go back to watering them as usual, only this time with filtered water.

4 – Sometimes, the Yellowing Is Just Natural

Don’t mistake the bottom leaves on a peace lily turning yellow as a sign of inadequate watering. The bottom leaves will naturally turn yellow.

They’re the first ones the plant kills off, which is why the top leaves are lush dark green with what should be plenty of blooms.

Pruning Yellow Leaves on a Peace Lily

Once the leaves on a peace lily turn yellow, no matter what you do, they’ll never turn green again. What they’ll do is develop brown spots first, and then eventually the leaves will start turning black, dying and falling off.

Do yourself and the rest of your plant’s leaves a favor and snip off every yellow leaf on the plant to help it develop fresh green foliage. Plus, the leaves closer to the base of the plant need more regular pruning.

What you see as a single flower on a peace lily is a cluster of tiny flowers attached to one big white leaf. Each stalk on a peace lily can only flower once. Once it’s spent, it starts to turn green and wilt.

The stalk has done its job and the entire stalk is then useless. Once the flower starts to turn from white to green and wilt, prune it from the base of the plant.

If you only trim the tip of the stalk, the leaves at the base of the plant will naturally turn yellow and die. This is just the plant’s way of killing off spent stalks.

Finally, if the only yellow leaves or brown leaves are at the base of the plant and the flower at the top of the stalk is spent, there’s nothing wrong. Just prune off the discolored leaves to let a new stalk grow in.

Fertilizing Peace Lilies

Peace lilies prefer half-strength fertilizer that’s either 10-10-10 or 20-20-20 formulas. They only need fertilizer added every 6–8 weeks.

You can always get creative and make your own fertilizer as well. This way, you can help your peace lilies produce tremendous blooms!

The Humidity Requirements for a Peace Lily

When the leaves of your peace lily only show brown edges instead of entire browning across the leaves, that’s a sign of a humidity issue.

To increase the humidity, you can use a pebble tray instead of just parking your peace lily on a saucer. As the water evaporates, the humidity rises to moisten the leaves. Plus, with a humidity tray under the plant, you won’t need to mist the leaves as often.

Peace lilies don’t need watering too frequently. Yet, without a humidifier or a humidity tray, you’ll likely need to mist the plant’s leaves two to three times daily when humidity is low.

Ideally, humidity should be above 50%. If it’s not, the plant won’t bloom as you’d expect it to.

Final Thoughts

Does your peace lily have yellow leaves that keep you wondering where it all went wrong?

The main causes of this occurrence have to do with sunburn, low water quality, or soil problems. Other times, it could be your plant’s natural way of shedding older leaves to focus all its energy on new growth.

Now that you know what to look for, solving your plant’s yellowing issues should be a breeze!

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