It is a common heathland shrub endemic to the coastal southwest of Western Australia.

This species was first formally described in 1867 by George Bentham in Compositae Flora Australiensis, who gave it the name Baeckea grandiflora, from specimens collected by James Drummond between the Moore and Murchison Rivers.

[3] In 2015, Barbara Rye transferred the species to Babingtonia as B. grandiflora in the journal Nuytsia.

[6] Babingtonia grandiflora is an upright, open shrub, that typically grows to a height of 0.5 to 2 metres (2 to 7 ft) and has erect or arching stems.

[4][2] Babingtonia grandiflora often occurs on plains, or on undulating hills and breakaways in the rocky hillsides, or outcrops from near Northampton to Boonanarring Nature Reserve in the Avon Wheatbelt, Geraldton Sandplains, Jarrah Forest and the Swan Coastal Plain bioregions of south-western Western Australia where it grows on gravelly loamy and sandy soils over laterite.