coconut, edible fruit of the coconut palm (Cocos nucifera), a tree of the palm family (Arecaceae). which consists of a fibrous husk encasing a large seed or inner stone. The term coconut also is used to refer to the entire large seed with its covering of hard, green, fibrous endocarp, or to the edible, commercially important, white and fleshy part of the seed, which in turn surrounds the hollow, fluid-filled, central cavity. The coconut palm has a straight, unbranched stem, with large, compound evergreen leaves that are pinnate, 4-6 meters long, with pinnae 60-90 centimeters long. The leaves are spirally arranged at the top of the stem. The old leaves break away cleanly leaving the trunk smooth.