English scientific society founded to promote 'Botany in all its branches, and its application to Medicine, Arts, and Manufacture, and also for the formation of extensive Botanical and Ornamental Gardens within the immediate vicinity of the metropolis'. It was established by royal charter granted to the Duke of Norfolk, the Duke of Richmond, the Earl of Albemarle, Lieut-Col. Rushbrooke, Philip Barnes and James de Carle Sowerby with Queen Victoria as Patron. Three generations of the Sowerby family were closely associated with the society and founder J. de C. Sowerby was secretary for 30 years.

Fellows of the society had the right to use the initials 'F.R.B.S.' after their names. The society had the lease of some 18 acres in Regent's Park for their garden created by landscape designer Robert Marnock. Marnock had had recently completed Sheffield Botanical Gardens for the Sheffield Botanical and Horticultural Society and was recommended by J.C. Loudon to become the first curator of the Regent's Park gardens (1840-1869). The gardens included a conservatory designed by Decimus Burton, a Botanic Museum and later opened a gardening school. Four horticultural exhibitions were held every year and became a fashionable part of the 'London scene', attracting many of the aristocracy. So succesful was the garden that attendance dropped sharply at the garden of the Horticultural Society of London at Chiswick and contributed to that society's considerable financial difficulties around 1850.

The society had a library and was responsible for a number of academic publications including Quarterly Record of the Royal Botanic Society of London (1880-1909), Botanical Journal (1910-1918) and Quarterly Summary and Meteorological Readings, Royal Botanic Society of London (1919-1930). Records of original acquisitions were published in the society journals. Today little remains of the original design of the society's botanical garden having suffered in the Second World War, and the restored area of the Regent's Park Inner Circle is now Queen Mary's Rose Garden.

Much of the original library is now held by the library of The Natural History Museum, including the diaries of James de Carle Sowerby. Many botanical specimens were acquired by BM (1932) after the demise of the organisation and can be identified by a slip label bearing the name of the society. The material includes British collections identified by the name of the society alone and other material, both British and foreign, from individually named collectors. Not to be confused with the Botanical Society of London, which later became the Botanical Society of the British Isles.