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Niche conservatism—the tendency for closely related species to be ecologically similar—is widespread^,,. However, most studies compare closely related taxa that occur in allopatry; in sympatry, the stabilizing forces that promote niche conservatism^,, and thus inhibit niche shifts, may be countered by natural selection favouring ecological divergence to minimize the intensity of interspecific interactions^,. Consequently, the relative importance of niche conservatism versus niche divergence in determining community structure has received little attention. Here, we examine a tropical lizard community in which species have a long evolutionary history of ecological interaction. We find that evolutionary divergence overcomes niche conservatism: closely related species are no more ecologically similar than expected by random divergence and some distantly related species are ecologically similar, leading to a community in …