Phytotaxa is a peer-reviewed, international journal for rapid publication of high quality papers on any aspect of systematic and taxonomic botany, with a preference for large taxonomic works such as monographs, floras, revisions and evolutionary studies and descriptions of new taxa. Phytotaxa covers all groups covered by the International Code of Nomenclature foralgae, fungi, and plants ICNafp (fungi, lichens, algae, diatoms, mosses, liverworts, hornworts, and vascular plants), both living and fossil. Phytotaxa was founded in 2009 as botanical sister journal to Zootaxa. It has a large editorial board, who are running this journal on a voluntary basis, and it is published by Magnolia Press (Auckland , New Zealand). It is also indexed by SCIE, JCR and Biosis.

All types of taxonomic, floristic and phytogeographic papers are considered, including theoretical papers and methodology, systematics and phylogeny, monographs, revisions and reviews, catalogues, biographies and bibliographies, history of botanical explorations, identification guides, floras, analyses of characters, phylogenetic studies and phytogeography, descriptions of taxa, typification and nomenclatural papers. Monographs and other long manuscripts (of 60 printed pages or more) can be published as books, which will receive an ISBN number as well as being part of the Phytotaxa series.