The Diosmeae are typical members of the Cape flora. Although the species-level taxonomy has recently received much attention, the generic limits have remained uncertain. In this study plastid DNA (psbA-trnH, atpB-rbcL, and rpl16) were sampled from across the morphological spectrum of species and analysed using parsimony and Bayesian inference. The combined results show Diosmeae to be monophyletic and a number of genera to be polyphyletic. These data are mostly incongruent with the morphology data and suggest that, together with broader sampling of molecular data, more careful examination of morphological characters is needed prior to the adjustment of generic circumscriptions.