The flowers of Commelinaceae are ephemeral, lack nectar, and offer only pollen as a reward to their pollinators.

Commelinaceae flowers tend to deceive pollinators by appearing to offer a larger reward than is actually present.

Plants typically have an erect or scrambling but ascending habit, often spreading by rooting at the nodes or by stolons.

The leaf blades are simple and entire (that is, they lack any teeth or lobes), they sometimes narrow at the base, and they are often succulent.

The way in which the leaves typically unfurl from bud is a distinctive feature of the family: it is termed involute, and means that the margins at the leaf base are rolled in when they first emerge.

Likewise, there are always three petals, but these may be equal or in two forms, free or basally fused, white or coloured.

The petals are sometimes clawed, meaning they narrow to stalk at the base where they attach to the rest of the flower.

They may be all fertile and equal or unequal, but in many genera two to four are staminodes (i.e. infertile, non-pollen producing stamens).

[8] The following is a phylogeny, or evolutionary tree, of most of the genera in Commelinaceae based on DNA sequences from the plastid gene rbcL[9] Cartonema Tinantia Weldenia Thyrsanthemum Elasis Tradescantia + Gibasis Callisia + Tripogandra Amischotolype Coleotrype Cyanotis Belosynapsis Dichorisandra Siderasis Cochliostema Plowmanianthus Geogenanthus Palisota Spatholirion Commelina Pollia Polyspatha Aneilema + Rhopalephora Floscopa Stanfieldiella Buforrestia Murdannia Anthericopsis All clades shown have 80% bootstrap support or better.