Lepidopteris ("scaly fern") is a form genus for leaves of Peltaspermaceae, an extinct family of seed plants, which lived from around 260 to 190 million years ago, from the Late Permian to Early Jurassic.
[6] In the form generic system of paleobotany Lepidopteris is used only for leaves, which are fern-like with pinnules attached to the rachis as well as the pinnae.
The cuticle of the leaves is thick and has a distinctive cuticular structure with stomatal opening overhung by papillae.
The ovules are commonly arranged in peltate structures which have been used to assign Lepidopteris to the Order Peltaspermales.
Lepidopteris was geographically widespread and ranged from Late Permian to Late Triassic but individual species had more restricted geographic extent and shorter stratigraphic ranges, as seen in the list below in stratigraphic order The cuticular structure of Lepidopteris is comparable to that of modern Ginkgo, which has been used to estimate past atmospheric carbon dioxide from its stomatal index.