A site about houseplants is about to tell you to use an artificial one. That is worth explaining rather than just asserting.
The choice is not the one you think it is
People frame this as real versus fake, and framed that way the answer is obvious and the real plant wins.
That is not the choice in a dark corner. The choice there is an artificial plant versus a real plant that declines and gets replaced, and framed that way it is a different question entirely.
The University of Illinois Extension puts Low Light at a north window a few feet away, an east or west window 3 to 10 feet away, or a south window 15 to 20 feet away. A genuinely dark corner is past that, and past the low band there is no plant that thrives, only plants that take longer to fail.
So the honest comparison is between something that will look the same in three years and something that will look progressively worse and then be thrown away.
First, make sure the corner is actually dark
Before conceding the position, check it properly, because people are poor judges of indoor light and usually underestimate it.
Use the distances above rather than the impression. Human eyes adapt, so a room that feels reasonably bright after ten minutes in it may be in the low band throughout.
Find where the corner sits relative to the nearest window and which way that window faces. A corner three feet from an east window is a real position. The same corner twelve feet from it is not.
Check it at different times of day, and remember that whatever you see at noon is the best it gets.
If the corner turns out to be in the low band rather than past it, you have options, and what can actually live in a hallway with no light covers the plants that genuinely hold in that band. The low band and no band are different findings.
The competing answer, which is not mine to give
The other way to make a dark corner work is to add light.
That is a legitimate route and it is not this site's subject. Fixtures, spectra, run times, equipment: a different specialty, covered properly elsewhere, and it deserves better than a paragraph here.
What is worth saying from a placement point of view is that adding light converts a dark corner into a position with running requirements, which is a real commitment for a corner you may not care about that much. Worth deciding whether the corner is worth that before you buy anything, and that decision is a placement question.
When artificial is straightforwardly the right call
A corner past the low band, in a room you use. No amount of plant selection fixes a position with no light.
A position you cannot reach. The top of a tall unit, a high shelf, anywhere that requires standing on something. A real plant you cannot attend to is a real plant that fails slowly and out of sight.
A rental where you are not adding equipment. Nothing to install, nothing to leave behind.
A place where the real one keeps failing. If the corner has been through three plants, the corner has already told you. The fourth plant is not a test, it is a habit.
A spot that needs greenery to work visually rather than to be a plant. Behind furniture, filling a gap, softening a hard edge at the far end of a room. That job is a visual one and it does not require photosynthesis.
When it is the wrong call
When the corner is fine and you have not checked. This is the common error in the other direction: conceding a position that would have supported a plant.
When the room already has several. Artificial plants work best sparingly. A room where most of the greenery is artificial reads as artificial, and the real plants elsewhere stop reading as real.
When you would rather have nothing. An empty corner is a legitimate design choice and frequently a better one than a filled corner. In a small room, emptiness is a resource.
Placing an artificial one, since placement is what this site does
The rules are almost the inverse of the ones for a living plant, which is what makes it interesting.
Put it where the light is worst. That is the entire point, and it frees your real positions for real plants.
Keep it away from the ones people look at closely. At the far end of a room, above eye level, or beside something else that draws attention. Proximity to a real plant invites comparison.
Do not put it in your best window. A striking artificial plant on a bright sill is spending your scarcest resource on something that does not use it, which is the single most wasteful placement in this whole subject.
Match the plant to the light in the room. An artificial plant that looks like a species requiring bright light, standing in a dark corner, reads wrong even to people who could not tell you why.
The version of this that most people actually need
Not one or the other, but both, allocated properly.
Real plants in your real positions, chosen for the bands they are in. Artificial ones in the places with no light, where nothing living was going to work. That is what a well-planted small apartment usually is, and nobody says so because plant articles are written to sell plants.
If you have not yet worked out which of your positions are which, the room-by-room survey is the thing that makes this decision easy. It usually turns up one or two corners that are genuinely hopeless and a couple that were better than assumed.
If you have pets
An artificial plant is not a plant, and animals chew things. That is a materials question rather than a toxicity one and it is not one this page can answer. For anything living, check the species by botanical name against the ASPCA's toxic and non-toxic plants database.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is it acceptable to use an artificial plant in a dark corner?
In a corner past the low band, yes, because the real choice is not fake against real. It is an artificial plant against a real plant that declines and gets replaced. The University of Illinois Extension puts Low Light at a north window a few feet away, an east or west window 3 to 10 feet away, or a south window 15 to 20 feet away, and past that band nothing thrives, some things just take longer to fail.
How do I know whether my corner is genuinely too dark?
Check it with distances rather than impressions, because human eyes adapt and a room that feels reasonably bright after ten minutes may be in the low band throughout. Work out where the corner sits relative to the nearest window and which way that window faces: a corner three feet from an east window is a real position and the same corner twelve feet from it is not. Check at different times of day, and remember that noon is the best it gets. The low band and no band are different findings.
When is an artificial plant clearly the right call?
In a corner past the low band in a room you actually use. In a position you cannot reach, such as the top of a tall unit, since a real plant you cannot attend to fails slowly and out of sight. In a rental where you are not installing equipment. In a spot that has already been through three plants, because the fourth is not a test, it is a habit. And where the job is visual, such as softening a hard edge at the far end of a room, since that does not require photosynthesis.
When is it the wrong call?
When the corner is fine and you never checked, which is the common error in the other direction. When the room already has several, because artificial plants work best sparingly and a room where most of the greenery is artificial makes the real plants stop reading as real. And when you would rather have nothing, since an empty corner is a legitimate choice and in a small room emptiness is a resource.
Where should an artificial plant go?
Almost the inverse of the rules for a living one. Put it where the light is worst, which is the whole point and frees your real positions for real plants. Keep it away from the plants people look at closely, because proximity invites comparison. And never put it in your best window, which is the most wasteful placement in the subject, since it spends your scarcest resource on something that does not use it.
The part worth remembering
In a corner with no usable light, the real plant is not the better option. It is the same option with a slower ending and a recurring cost.
Check the corner properly first, using distances rather than impressions. If it is genuinely past the low band, put something artificial there and spend your real plants on the positions that can carry them. If your best window happens to face north, that band is worth understanding before you write any position off.