Native of central China, sometimes cultivated and occasionally escaped, mostly along streets, fences, and yards in urban areas, also sites of old buildings, railroads, and earthen banks. Our earliest collections were made in ca. 1860 from Madison and 1875 from Lake Geneva, but it is impossible to ascertain now whether these or other early collections were taken outside of cultivation.

Goji berries, the rave of the health food industry, are the fruits of both L. barbarum and the closely related L. chinense Mill., used in traditional medicine and as a food supplement in Asia for generations in the hope of living longer.