The genus is famed as the supplier of mahogany, at first yielded by Swietenia mahagoni, a Caribbean species, which was so extensively used locally and exported that its trade ended by the 1950s.

These days almost all mahogany is yielded by the mainland species, Swietenia macrophylla, although no longer from its native locations due to the restrictions set by CITES (see following.)

As a timber, both Swietenia macrophylla and Swietenia mahogoni are both grown in plantations in several Asian countries such as Fiji, Indonesia, India, and Bangladesh and this plantation mahogany timber is the main source of the world's current supply of "genuine mahogany", due to cultivation and trade of it in its native locations being restricted by the Convention On International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES) since the late 1990s.

Species of this genus are only occasionally plantation-grown in Central America, in spite of the good growing conditions and high price of the wood, due to the ubiquitous presence of the mahogany shoot borer moth (also known as the cedar tip moth), Hypsipyla grandella, which damages the form of the tree by killing the terminal shoot, causing excessive branching.

International environmental organizations such as Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, and Rainforest Action Network have focused on Swietenia so as to expose illegal traffic in the wood, notably from Brazil.