The following is a simple tabular summary of some of the key events in the evolution of plants. This table is based on Willis & McElwain (2002), Fig. 1.1., p.4.

Era	Period	Period	Epoch	Age (×106 years)	Events
Cenozoic	Quaternary	Neogene	Holocene
			Pleistocene	1.8
	Tertiary		Pliocene	5.3	The angiosperms (flowering plants) dominate the landscape.
			Miocene	23.8
		Palaeogene	Oligocene	33.7
			Eocene	54.8
			Palaeocene	65	Angiosperms rise as the gymnosperms decline. Period of massive extinctions.
Mesozoic		Cretaceous	late		The gymnosperms are dominant, and the last of the seed ferns become extinct.
			early	144
		Jurassic	late		The gymnosperms begin to dominate the land as the seed ferns begin to decline.
			middle
			early	206
		Triassic	late		The seed ferns begin their rapid decline
			middle
			early	248
Palaeozoic		Permian	late
			early	290	Great Coal Forests. The beginning of the evolution of ferns, seed ferns, horsetails and gymnosperms. Lycopods common.
		Carboniferous	late	323
			early	354	Expansion of primitive vascular plants. Liverworts develop. First seed plants develop towards the end of this epoch.
		Devonian	late
			middle		The early vascular plants colonise the land for the first time. Representatives include the rhyniaphyta.
			early	417
		Silurian	late
			early	443	Marine algae are abundant.
		Ordovician	late
			early	490
		Cambrian	late		Primitive marine algae develop.
			middle
			early	543	Protists and prokaryotes develop.
Precambrian				4600	Formation/Creation of the solar system and Earth