diff --git a/doc/source/whatsnew/v2.1.0.rst b/doc/source/whatsnew/v2.1.0.rst
index 5477694941125..a5222263a8177 100644
--- a/doc/source/whatsnew/v2.1.0.rst
+++ b/doc/source/whatsnew/v2.1.0.rst
@@ -793,9 +793,9 @@ Period
 
 Plotting
 ^^^^^^^^
+- Bug in :func:`scatter_matrix` where the ``grid`` parameter was ignored (:issue:`50818`)
 - Bug in :meth:`Series.plot` when invoked with ``color=None`` (:issue:`51953`)
 - Fixed UserWarning in :meth:`DataFrame.plot.scatter` when invoked with ``c="b"`` (:issue:`53908`)
--
 
 Groupby/resample/rolling
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
diff --git a/pandas/plotting/_matplotlib/misc.py b/pandas/plotting/_matplotlib/misc.py
index 1f9212587e05e..71a8e12fcad5f 100644
--- a/pandas/plotting/_matplotlib/misc.py
+++ b/pandas/plotting/_matplotlib/misc.py
@@ -102,11 +102,16 @@ def scatter_matrix(
 
             ax.set_xlabel(b)
             ax.set_ylabel(a)
+            if i != j:
+                ax.grid(grid)
 
-            if j != 0:
-                ax.yaxis.set_visible(False)
-            if i != n - 1:
-                ax.xaxis.set_visible(False)
+            if j != 0:  # if its not on the left
+                ax.set_ylabel("")
+                ax.set_yticklabels([])
+
+            if i != n - 1:  # if its not on the bottom
+                ax.set_xlabel("")
+                ax.set_xticklabels([])
 
     if len(df.columns) > 1:
         lim1 = boundaries_list[0]
diff --git a/pandas/plotting/_misc.py b/pandas/plotting/_misc.py
index 625780ac9fc67..7d62ba287f717 100644
--- a/pandas/plotting/_misc.py
+++ b/pandas/plotting/_misc.py
@@ -206,15 +206,11 @@ def scatter_matrix(
 
         >>> df = pd.DataFrame(np.random.randn(1000, 4), columns=['A','B','C','D'])
         >>> pd.plotting.scatter_matrix(df, alpha=0.2)
-        array([[<Axes: xlabel='A', ylabel='A'>, <Axes: xlabel='B', ylabel='A'>,
-                <Axes: xlabel='C', ylabel='A'>, <Axes: xlabel='D', ylabel='A'>],
-               [<Axes: xlabel='A', ylabel='B'>, <Axes: xlabel='B', ylabel='B'>,
-                <Axes: xlabel='C', ylabel='B'>, <Axes: xlabel='D', ylabel='B'>],
-               [<Axes: xlabel='A', ylabel='C'>, <Axes: xlabel='B', ylabel='C'>,
-                <Axes: xlabel='C', ylabel='C'>, <Axes: xlabel='D', ylabel='C'>],
-               [<Axes: xlabel='A', ylabel='D'>, <Axes: xlabel='B', ylabel='D'>,
-                <Axes: xlabel='C', ylabel='D'>, <Axes: xlabel='D', ylabel='D'>]],
-              dtype=object)
+        array([[<Axes: ylabel='A'>, <Axes: >, <Axes: >, <Axes: >],
+           [<Axes: ylabel='B'>, <Axes: >, <Axes: >, <Axes: >],
+           [<Axes: ylabel='C'>, <Axes: >, <Axes: >, <Axes: >],
+           [<Axes: xlabel='A', ylabel='D'>, <Axes: xlabel='B'>,
+            <Axes: xlabel='C'>, <Axes: xlabel='D'>]], dtype=object)
     """
     plot_backend = _get_plot_backend("matplotlib")
     return plot_backend.scatter_matrix(