There is a very specific type of heartbreak in this world when you wait for six weeks for a new monstera leaf to unfurl in Spring and to see that it’s smooth without the glorious, big holes, splits (or fenestrations if you’re a botanist). Ironically, monstera leaves sort of look like a giant heart when they don’t have holes!
When I first started growing my Monstera deliciosa plants (called deliciosa because their fruit is apparently delicious), I waited for monstera leaves to develop holes as the plant matured. I wanted the sort of leaves that had splits and holes everywhere, as you see on Instagram and Pinterest!
I did a bit of dedicated research into the biology of the monstera plant, and in essence, what I found out was that the splits and holes in the leaves only typically occur when the plant isn’t under stress and has lots of surplus resources to grow the holey leaf shapes…
So if your monstera isn’t developing the leaf shapes you desire, then it is likely under some duress or has enough energy to survive, but not necessarily to the point of thriving. So in the article I’ll share with you how to read your monstera to undertsand the causes of no leaf splits and identify the specific trigger that you can use to stimulate more leaf holes in your new leaves.
1. The Monstera’s Energy Budget Theory (Expert Insight From Research)
So, for us to understand why our monstera leaves aren’t splitting, we have to understand why they split and develop holes in the first place.
Monstera are native to rainforests in the Americas, and in the forest, a large, solid leaf (keep in mind that in the native environment, the leaves can be bigger than dinner plates) can act like a sail in the wind.
Imagine a storm comes in, what would happen with leaves this size is that the collective wind resistance of all the leaves would tear the monstera right off the supporting plant. The holes are strategically there to allow the wind to pass through.
In addition to this, the holes allow filtered light to reach the monstera’s leaves lower down the plant.
These fenestrations require some complex cellular architecture to make the leaf with holes and splits compared to a smaller solid one, which is much easier for the plant to make.
So if your monstera is poor in terms of low light, low nutrients, desnse soil then it’ll typically only grow smaller leaves without splits. However if you create the conditions where your monstera feels rich, in terms of light, and an nice arated soil mix then your monstera is going to grow bigger leaves with more splits.
Also we need to recreate some of the conditions of the monstera’s natural environment for more splits.
2. Light is the Most Important Stimulant
You can fertilize your monstera with all the best methods, but without a good amount of light intensity, it’s far less likely to develop splits and holes. I love to experiment with gardening, and I once ran a mini trial for my own curiosity with two cuttings from the same monstera plant:
- Plant A: I Placed in a moderately bright corner of the room, around about 10 feet from the window.
- Plant B: With this, I placed it 2 feet from a South-facing window with a sheer curtain (to protect it from direct sunlight, which can scorch.
The result was that Plant A produced four large, beautiful, solid leaves (this was from March to September). My Plant B’s first leaf had two splits, and the other 3 had a mix of splits and extra holes, and they were much larger.
The lesson is: If you want more splits and holes, you find a really bright spot of bright indirect light.
A cool trick I used when I was living in an apartment without much bright light is to use a grow light (which I originally bought for my succulents) and give my monstera supplementary bright light. This, hands down, made the biggest difference of anything on this list. The leaves that unfurled the following spring (I started using it in Winter) were bigger than ever, with more splits.
If you really want a prize-winning Monstera plant, I can promise you this is the most important thing you can do.
3. The Anchor to a Tree Effect (Vertical Support)
This is a very interesting step where we seek to replicate some of the conditions of the Monstera’s natural environment.
Monstera only mature properly when they find a tree to climb (they are hemiepiphytes in their jungle habitat, which means some of the roots are in the ground, and when they mature, they climb trees and develop roots on the tree for support whilst growing).
The Science of tree climbing…Thigmotropism: When the stem of your Monstera feels a solid, vertical surface (like a moss or coconut coir pole), it releases a hormone that stimulates the plant to start maturing from its juvenile phase of being rooted in the ground.
So if you have a monstera that is flopping over and trailing on the ground, your plant feels unstable. It stays in its juvenile (solid leaf) state with much smaller leaves without holes to keep its weight lower.
My Personal strategy: Now whatI do is, I act premeptively and don’t wait for the plant to get roo big to add a support coconut coirr pole and I stake my monstera early. This stimulates the aerial roots to grow (as the mostera has found a tree to grow up) and as soon as the aerial roots start to emerge, I tie them on the moist moss pole.
Its actually quite a fascinating process as once the monstera trusts that it is anchored to a tree, the next leaf to unfurl is, in my experience almost always significantly bigger more fenestrated than the other leaves.
4. The Best Soil Mix for Monstera to Promote Split Leaves
If your Monstera’s roots are struggling, then your leaves are not going to split. I see a lot of monstera plants that are sold at the supermarket in dense potting soil that stays damp for too long and does not mimic the sort of soil structure that monstera grow in naturally.
This deprives the roots of oxygen, it needs for root respiration, and is at odds with how they grow in nature, meaning your monstera has to direct all its energy to staying alive rather than growing big, holey leaves.
My Soil Recipe for success: For my Monstera, I’ve moved away from just normal potting soil and found better success with a 1:1:1 ratio of 1 part potting normal soil, 1 part perlite, and 1 part pine bark chippings like those for orchids.
The pine bark is the key here, and I often just use orchid potting mixes for this. The large bark pieces have a large particle size in the mix, which keeps the soil porous and aerated.
Monstera are hemiepiphytes, and they love to grow in bark like their natural soil. This oxygen-rich soil mix gives the monstera the oxygen it needs at the roots so the roots can respire properly, not be under stress and draw up the nutrients they need to grow its bigger leaves with more splits.
5. When Does a Monstera Leaf Start Splitting? (Maturity)
If your plant is still just a juvenile (with only 3–5 leaves), it may just be a patience game. From experience, a Monstera doesn’t start having dramatically split leaves until it is around 2 to 3 years old or has reached a certain stem thickness.
FYI, you can bypass this stage if you propagate a good cutting from an already mature monstera, if you choose one with a thick stem!
How to tell if it’s maturing: Look at the stem (the petiole) of your newest leaf. Does it look significantly thicker than the one before it? Does it have a sort of ruffled edge where it meets the leaf? These are biological signals that your monstera is maturing, and the next leaf is likely to have your first splits.
Summary Reference Table for Split Leaf Monsteras
| The plant feels “unstable” and stays juvenile. | The Biological Reason | My Expert Fix |
| Low Light Intensity | Not enough “energy” to build complex leaves. | Move to a spot with 2 hours of soft morning sun. |
| No Vertical Support | Plant feels “unstable” and stays juvenile. | Secure the “back” of the plant to a moss pole. |
| Dense, Wet Soil | Root suffocation prevents nutrient uptake. | Switch to 1:1:1 Soil/Perlite/Pine Bark mix. |
| Plant is too young | Needs to reach “maturity” threshold. | Keep the environment consistent; watch for stem thickening. |
My Final Thoughts on mature monstera leaves
Don’t be discouraged if your Monstera plants grow another solid-looking leaf after a split one, which does occasionally happen. It usually indicates the monstera has encountered some stress from some environmental factors, such as the temperature dropping (which often happens if you have a monstera near an outside door that keeps being opened and gets a blast of cold air, for example), or you missed a watering.
If you want the “Swiss Cheese” aesthetic, then stop treating your Monstera like a pothos and give it brighter yet indirect light, a moss or coconut coir pole to climb, and that pine bark soil. Once the plant has its resources and feels anchored, it won’t be able to stop itself from splitting its leaves.