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Faux olive trees are everywhere right now, and most of them look terrible. We know this because we have bought over a dozen of them while sourcing products for our room designs and Denver rental properties. The difference between a faux olive tree that elevates a room and one that screams “I bought a fake plant” comes down to about three details that most Amazon listings do not help you evaluate.
Here is what to look for and the five that actually passed our test.
Which faux olive trees actually look real?
The ones with irregular branch structure and matte leaves. That is the single biggest tell. Real olive trees have branches that grow at uneven angles, with clusters of leaves that vary in density. Cheap faux olive trees have perfectly symmetrical branches radiating from a center trunk at identical angles, with uniform leaf clusters that look like they were stamped from the same mold — because they were.
The second tell is leaf finish. Real olive leaves have a matte, slightly dusty quality on top and a silvery underside. Good faux olives replicate this two-tone effect. Bad ones have uniform, slightly glossy leaves that catch light in a way real leaves never do. If your faux tree has a sheen under indoor lighting, it reads as plastic instantly.
The third tell is the trunk. Real olive trunks are gnarled, irregular, and grey-brown with visible texture variation. The best faux olive trees use real wood or high-quality molded trunks that replicate this. Cheap ones have a smooth, uniformly colored plastic trunk that no one mistakes for real wood, no matter how good the leaves are.
When we evaluate faux trees, the trunk is actually where we start. If the trunk looks fake, nothing else can save it.
Does pot style matter more than the tree itself?
Honestly, almost. Here is a secret that staging professionals know: the pot is at eye level, the canopy is above eye level. Guests, visitors, and even you in your daily life spend far more time looking at the base of the tree than the top. A mediocre faux tree in a beautiful pot looks better than an excellent faux tree in the cheap black plastic nursery pot it ships in.
We repot every single faux tree we buy. Every one. The pots that come with Amazon faux trees are universally bad. They are thin, light, and obviously plastic. Replacing the pot takes 10 minutes and costs $20-$40, and it is the single highest-impact thing you can do to make any faux plant look real.
Our go-to strategy is a textured ceramic pot in white, grey, or terracotta, sized about 2 inches wider in diameter than the base of the tree. Fill the bottom with rocks or sand for weight — this also prevents the tree from tipping, which is a real problem with the lightweight plastic bases. Top the soil area with preserved sheet moss or small river rocks. From three feet away, it is indistinguishable from a real potted olive tree. [AFFILIATE: textured ceramic planter pot for faux trees]
How tall should a faux tree be for a living room corner?
For standard 8-foot ceilings, a 5 to 6 foot tree is the right proportion. The top of the canopy should sit roughly 12 to 18 inches below the ceiling. This creates a sense of height without crowding the space above.
The most common mistake we see is buying a tree that is too short. A 4-foot faux tree in a living room corner looks like a large houseplant, not a tree. It does not fill the vertical space and it does not create the grounding effect that a tree is supposed to provide. You want it to command the corner.
For rooms with 9 or 10-foot ceilings, go 6 to 7 feet. For rooms with vaulted or cathedral ceilings, you might need a 7-foot tree or you might be better served by a different solution entirely — a single tree can look lost in a room with 14-foot ceilings.
Also consider sight lines. If the tree sits behind a sofa, you lose about 30 inches of perceived height to the sofa back. A 5-foot tree behind a sofa barely peeks out. Go 6 feet minimum in that placement.
The 5 faux olive trees we recommend (ranked)
We ordered, unboxed, styled, and photographed all of these. Here they are, best to worst.
1. Best overall: Nearly Natural 5.5-foot olive tree. This is the one. The trunk is real driftwood, which immediately solves the biggest fake-tree problem. The branches are wired so you can shape them into an irregular, natural arrangement. The leaves are matte with accurate two-tone coloring. Out of the box it looks good. After 10 minutes of branch shaping and a repot into a ceramic planter, it looks genuinely real. We have this in four properties and our personal living room. Every single time, someone asks if it is real. [AFFILIATE: Nearly Natural 5.5ft olive silk tree]
2. Best budget option: Viagdo 5-foot olive tree. At under $50, this is absurdly good value. The trunk is plastic but has decent texture and color variation. The leaves are acceptable — not as convincing as the Nearly Natural but well above average for the price. The key with this one is aggressive branch shaping. Out of the box it looks like a fake tree. After 20 minutes of bending every branch into a unique position and repotting, it passes at a normal viewing distance. For rentals where you need multiple trees across multiple units, this is the smart buy. [AFFILIATE: Viagdo 5ft artificial olive tree]
3. Best premium option: Pottery Barn faux olive tree. Yes, it is significantly more expensive than Amazon options. Yes, the quality difference is real. The leaf detail, trunk texture, and overall silhouette are noticeably better than anything on Amazon. If this is for your personal living room and you want the absolute most realistic faux tree available, this is it. We would not put this in a rental — the cost does not justify the incremental quality improvement for guests who will not examine it closely.
4. Acceptable alternative: Realead 6-foot olive tree. Good height, reasonable leaf quality, decent trunk. The main issue is that the branch structure is too symmetrical out of the box and harder to reshape than wired alternatives. With effort, you can get this to look natural, but it takes more work than the Nearly Natural or Viagdo. If the top three are out of stock, this is a fine backup.
5. Skip it: most Amazon options under $30. We have to be blunt. We bought five sub-$30 faux olive trees from various Amazon sellers and none of them cleared our bar. Glossy leaves, smooth plastic trunks, identical branch angles. No amount of styling, repotting, or branch shaping made them look like anything other than a fake tree. The $20 you save is not worth the plastic-plant energy it adds to your room. [AFFILIATE: Realead 6ft artificial olive tree]
What about other faux trees and plants?
Olive trees get all the attention, but they are not the only option. Faux fiddle leaf figs remain a solid choice for modern and mid-century spaces — the large, distinctive leaves are actually easier to fake convincingly because the shape is so specific. We also like faux bird of paradise plants for tropical or bohemian spaces, and faux Norfolk Island pines for coastal or Scandinavian rooms.
The same principles apply to all faux plants: matte leaves, irregular structure, real or realistic trunk, quality pot. The pot trick we described above works for any faux plant and is always the single best upgrade you can make.
For smaller faux plants — countertop herbs, shelf succulents, table centerpieces — the quality floor is higher because they are viewed at close range. Cheap faux succulents on a shelf look fake from 2 feet away. Either buy premium small faux plants or skip them. Ironically, large faux trees are easier to pull off because the viewing distance is more forgiving.
The Bottom Line
Buy the Nearly Natural 5.5-foot olive tree, repot it into a ceramic planter with moss on top, and spend 10 minutes shaping the branches. That is the formula. It works in every design style, every room size, and every property type. Faux plants are one of the rare categories where a single product recommendation covers almost everyone, and this is that product.
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