The Buxales are a small order of eudicot flowering plants, recognized by the APG IV system of 2016.

They have separate "male" (staminate) and "female" (carpellate) flowers, mostly on the same plant (i.e. they are mostly monoecious).

Other characters common to the order include leaves with entire (untoothed) margins, flowers arranged in racemes, small styles capable of receiving pollen along their entire length rather than having a separate stigma, one to two ovules per carpel, and seeds with testae (coats) made up of several cell layers.

[2] Didymeles, the sole genus in the family Didymelaceae, consists of two species of evergreen tree occurring only in Madagascar.

Buxaceae (including Haptanthaceae) is more diverse, with five or six genera totalling about 115 species, and is found in most temperate and tropical areas of the world.

[2] One possible phylogenetic tree is shown below, where the precise ordering of the basal eudicots is still uncertain.