A 30-Year overview of soil fertility, soil quality, and soil health research in Florida

• 30-year trend shows shift from soil fertility to soil quality and health focus. • Soil health/quality is often mentioned superficially, lacking proper integration. • The most common indicators are organic carbon, pH and available P and N. • Physical and biological indicators are under-represented but show great potential. • Future studies must integrate soil health concepts with soil functions and services. Florida’s unique combination of sandy soils, diverse agroecosystems, and climate-related vulnerabilities makes it a globally relevant case study for understanding the evolution of soil science. Over the past three decades, research in Florida has shifted from chemically focused soil fertility (SF) assessments toward more integrative frameworks emphasizing soil quality (SQ) and soil health (SH). However, gaps persist in fully integrating these concepts into assessments and not merely using them in broader contexts. This systematic review addresses three guiding questions: (1) How have SH and SQ been adopted and applied in Florida-based soil research over time? (2) What types of indicators are used to assess soil function, and how often are they linked to ecosystem services? (3) What regional, thematic, and conceptual gaps exist across literature? Following the PRISMA guidelines, duplicates were removed, and studies focusing on Florida were retained, with grey literature included, yielding a final dataset of 132 SH, 391 SF, and 190 SQ studies. Results reveal that chemical indicators continue to dominate, while integration of biological and physical indicators remains limited. Key gaps include underrepresentation of ecologically critical soils (e.g., Histosols, Ultisols), land uses such as wetlands and cover crops, and studies from Central and North Florida. Furthermore, only a few studies explicitly connect SH/SQ indicators to ecosystem services such as nutrient cycling, water regulation, or carbon sequestration. This review introduces a novel indicator-based synthesis framework for soil health literature and calls for regionally adapted, functionally oriented SH assessments. Florida’s soil diversity and agroecological variability reflect broader global conditions, especially in tropical, sandy, and agriculturally intensive regions, making these findings transferable to international efforts in sustainable land management and ecological soil evaluation.