We studied correlations between geographical range sizes and plant structural and ecological characteristics of 45 palm taxa occurring in western Amazonian lowland rainforests. The studied plant features were stem height, fruit size, cespitose growth form, response to variation in soil cation content and occurrence in seven different not soil-related habitat types. The most widespread palms tended to be tall, be utilised by people and have relatively wide tolerances to differences in soil fertility and habitat quality. Cespitose growth form and fruit size were not related to the variation in range size. Tallness may be associated with better seed dispersers which contributes to wider ranges. The positive link between range size and edaphic and habitat generality demonstrates the importance of relatively deterministic environmental factors in controlling the distributions of plants. Other studies linking plant attributes with range size have produced rather disagreeing results and this study is not able to clarify the overall picture. It may be that the discrepancies arise at least partly from ecological differences among the studied floras. If the result that tall plants are more widespread than small plants in rain forest floras is a general one, it would have important implications for the prospects of generalising the results of plant ecological studies performed with only one or a restricted set of growth forms to the rest of the flora.