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Aim  To investigate the species–area relationship (SAR) of plants on very small islands, to examine the effect of other factors on species richness, and to check for a possible Small Island Effect (SIE).

Location  The study used data on the floral composition of 86 very small islands (all < 0.050 km²) of the Aegean archipelago (Greece).

Methods  We used standard techniques for linear and nonlinear regression in order to check several models of the SAR, and stepwise multiple regression to check for the effects of factors other than area on species richness (‘habitat diversity’, elevation, and distance from nearest large island), as well as the performance of the Choros model. We also checked for the SAR of certain taxonomic and ecological plant groups that are of special importance in eastern Mediterranean islands, such as halophytes, therophytes, Leguminosae and Gramineae. We used one‐way anova to …