There are 30 recognised Durio species, at least nine of which produce edible fruit. Named in some regions as the “king of fruits”, the durian is distinctive for its large size, fruit beer name odour, and thorn-covered rind.

An acquired taste, some people regard the durian as having a pleasantly sweet fragrance, whereas others find the aroma overpowering and unpleasant. The smell evokes reactions from deep appreciation to intense disgust, and has been described variously as rotten onions, turpentine, and raw sewage. There is one, yt is called in the Malaca tongue Durion, and is so good that it doth exceede in savour all others that euer they had seene, or tasted. Other historical variants include duryoen, duroyen, durean, and dorian. For a complete list of known species of Durio, see List of Durio species. Durio sensu lato has 30 recognised species. Durio sensu stricto comprises 24 of these species.

The 6 additional species included in Durio s. The genus Durio is placed by some taxonomists in the family Bombacaceae, or by others in a broadly defined Malvaceae that includes Bombacaceae, and by others in a smaller family of just seven genera Durionaceae. Since this species is open-pollinated, it shows considerable diversity in fruit colour and odour, size of flesh and seed, and tree phenology. In the species name, zibethinus refers to the Indian civet, Viverra zibetha. Durian flowers are large and feathery with copious nectar, and give off a heavy, sour, and buttery odour.

These features are typical of flowers pollinated by certain species of bats that eat nectar and pollen. Durio, Boschia, and Cullenia was in conjunction with a transition from beetle pollination to vertebrate pollination. Different cultivars of durian often have distinct colours. Over the centuries, numerous durian cultivars, propagated by vegetative clones, have arisen in Southeast Asia.

The Malaysian Ministry of Agriculture and Agro-Based Industry started to register varieties of durian in 1934, and now maintains a list of registered varieties, where each cultivar is assigned a common name and a code number starting with “D”. These codes are widely used through South-East Asia, and as of 2021, there are over 200 registered varieties. The flesh is medium-thick, solid, yellow in colour, and sweet. The fruit is medium-sized with oval shape, brownish green skin having short thorns.