Magnolia champaca is a large evergreen tree, native to the Indomalaya ecozone (consisting of South Asia, Southeast Asia and some parts of China). It is best known for its strongly fragrant yellow or white flowers. It is, however, primarily cultivated for its timber, and is also used in urban landscaping. Its aril-covered seeds are highly attractive to birds.

This species occurs in varying shades of cream to yellow-orange. In China, M. champaca var. pubinervia is documented.Magnolia × alba is a hybrid cultivar of M. champaca. In Thailand, there has been some purported man-made hybrids with other magnolia species including Magnolia liliifera and Magnolia coco.

The species epithet, champaca, comes from the Sanskrit word campaka (pronounced tʃaɱpaka). Common names in other languages include champaca, champak; Sonchaaphaa (सोन चाफ़ा) in the Marathi language; Chenbakam/Chenpakam (செண்பகம்) in Tamil; Chenbagam in Malayalam; shornochampa (golden champa), স্বর্ণচাঁপা in Bengali; champa, cempaka, sampenga and sampangi in Telugu; Sampige (ಸಂಪಿಗೆ) in Kannada; and shamba. All other names above apply to Plumeria varieties as well, with the exception of Sonchaaphaa, which is used exclusively for this particular subvariety in Western India. Some half a dozen varieties of Plumeria together with Magnolia champaca (three varieties) and two varieties of Ylang Ylang are generically called Chaaphaa in Marathi, though in some cases, a futher descriptor is added: the red plumeria variety, for instance, is Dev Chaaphaa or God's Champa, and the two Ylang Ylang varieties each have a separate name as well.