Why coffee plant has brown tips

Separate dry brown tips or margins from discrete brown spots, broad scorched patches and leaves that are also dropping. The visible categories guide observation only. They do not identify one cause or prove a coffee-specific disease.

Check whether the mix is consistently damp or staying wet, whether roots and drainage look sound, and whether the plant is near dry air, a radiator, a cold draft, strong sun or a window. Also review water quality, fertilizer or salt buildup, humidity, temperature and pests or spreading spots.

Brown tips can follow low humidity or dry air, inconsistent watering, soil that remains too wet, fertilizer or soluble-salt buildup, unsuitable water quality or high pH, direct heat or sun, drafts and cold stress, and pests or leaf spots when the pattern is spreading.

First compare moisture and drainage with the exact plant’s preference for consistently damp but not soggy mix. Then stabilize humidity and temperature, move the pot away from harsh sun or drafts, review water and fertilizer history and trim only dead brown tissue for appearance while the pattern is watched.

After one environmental change, watch the newest leaves, whether new tips brown, whether spots spread and whether leaf drop continues. Old dead tissue will not return to green, and recovery has no set number of days.

Coffea arabica has its own needs for moisture, humidity and temperature, but many of the brown-tip causes here apply to houseplants in general. Tip color alone cannot tell you the cause, the nutrient status or whether there is disease.