Compare / The best vegetable garden planner apps in 2026
The best vegetable garden planner apps in 2026
Grow To Eat is the best vegetable garden planner for most food growers in 2026, mostly because of what costs nothing: the whole sowing plan, the weekly list of what to do, harvest tracking and all 120+ growing guides, with no cap on any of it.
Most of these apps are built around the same idea: a drag-and-drop bed planner with a sowing calendar attached. They differ in what happens after the seeds are in the ground. Here is what each one does, what the free tier covers, and what a year costs.
Last updated September 2026
Quick picks
- Best overall, and best free plan: Grow To Eat — Sowing dates from your location, a weekly task list, and nothing capped on the free tier.
- Best for crop rotation: GrowVeg / Almanac Garden Planner — Warns you when a family repeats in a bed, using five years of your own plans.
- Best square-foot planner: Planter — A grid of squares with companion warnings as you place.
- Best free plot drawer: VegPlotter — Draw the plot for nothing; the jobs list is on the paid plans.
- Best for a quick climate-zone lookup: Gardenate — What can go in this month where you live, with no account to make.
#1
Grow To Eat
Best for a plan that keeps up with the garden
Pricing: Free with no time limit. Premium €7.49 a month or €44.99 a year, with a 7-day trial on the yearly plan.
Pros
- ✓Dates built from your location, not a zone you pick off a list
- ✓Sow a fortnight late and every date after it moves with you
- ✓A weekly view: sowings, next steps and harvests together
- ✓120+ crops, all food, each with an A–Z guide from propagation to preservation
- ✓Crop filters for shade, pollinator value and difficulty
- ✓The free tier caps none of that, and harvest tracking sits inside it
Cons
- ✗Northern hemisphere only — no use in Australia or New Zealand
- ✗No push notifications yet; the list waits for you to open the app
- ✗The bed planner, succession planting and custom crops are Premium
- ✗No photo journal and no export of your data
- ✗No crop rotation or plant spacing warnings
- ✗Edible crops only, and English only today
Best for: Growing food to a schedule on a phone, with the plan keeping up when the season does not go to plan.
A sowing plan for your garden, free
Dates from your location, and a weekly list of what to do next. No credit card required.
#2
GrowVeg / Almanac Garden Planner
Best for drawing a layout and rotating crops
Pricing: $35 a year recurring, or $50 for a single year. 7-day trial, no card.
Pros
- ✓Crop rotation warnings when a family repeats in the same bed
- ✓Plant spacing worked out for you as you draw
- ✓The largest plant list here — 408 types and thousands of named varieties
- ✓Companion planting suggestions inside the layout
- ✓Email reminders through the season
Cons
- ✗Runs in a browser — nothing native to carry out to the beds
- ✗No free tier: a 7-day trial, then a subscription
- ✗Access to your plan ends when the subscription does
- ✗The library spans ornamentals and trees, so a food grower reads past most of it
Best for: Designing a layout at a desk before the season starts, and rotating families year to year.
#3
Planter
Best for laying out raised beds on a phone
Pricing: $24.99 a year, or $99.99 once. Free tier with one garden.
Pros
- ✓The free tier includes a garden, a calendar and your own custom plants
- ✓A square-foot grid with illustrated tiles, built for a phone
- ✓Companion and spacing warnings while you lay the bed out
- ✓A one-off lifetime price instead of a subscription
Cons
- ✗The help mostly stops once the layout is drawn
- ✗Planting dates are less specific to where you are than the schedulers here
- ✗Named varieties sit in a list rather than driving the dates
Best for: Laying out raised beds on a phone, cheaply, before anything goes in.
#4
VegPlotter
Best free plot drawer
Pricing: $22 Essentials, $35 Advanced a year. Free tier capped at 40 plantings.
Pros
- ✓The layout planner itself is free
- ✓A month slider showing the plot filling and emptying through the year
- ✓Crop rotation and companion guidance while you place crops
- ✓A monthly jobs list through the season
Cons
- ✗The free tier stops at 40 plantings a year
- ✗Ticking the jobs off is on the paid plans
- ✗The jobs list is monthly rather than weekly
Best for: Allotment holders who want to draw a plot properly without paying for it.
#5
Gardenate
Best for a quick climate-zone lookup
Pricing: Free on the web. The full app is about $2, once.
Pros
- ✓Free on the web, and about $2 once for the full app
- ✓Six countries, including Australia, New Zealand and South Africa
- ✓Sowing depth, spacing, companions, weeks to harvest and kitchen notes per plant
- ✓Scan a seed packet to save the variety
- ✓Reminders into the phone calendar you already use, and it works offline
Cons
- ✗The list is the same for everyone in your climate zone, wherever you are inside it
- ✗No bed planner and no weekly view
- ✗Planting records only — nothing works forward from them
Best for: A free answer to what can be sown this month, with no account and no setup.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best vegetable garden planner app?
Grow To Eat is the best vegetable garden planner for most food growers in 2026. It sets sowing dates from your location rather than a zone you pick off a list, moves every later date when you sow late, and puts the week's sowings, next steps and harvests on one screen — none of it capped on the free tier. If crop rotation warnings are what you are choosing on, GrowVeg handles them inside the layout.
Is there a free vegetable garden planner?
Yes. Grow To Eat's free tier has no cap on the sowing plan, the weekly view, harvest tracking or the A-Z growing guides. Gardenate is free on the web with no account. VegPlotter gives you the layout planner free and charges to tick jobs off. Planter's free tier includes one garden. GrowVeg has a 7-day trial and no free tier after it.
Which vegetable garden planner works outside the United States?
Grow To Eat works anywhere in the northern hemisphere, including the UK, Europe, the US and Canada, because it sets dates from your location rather than a US zip code. GrowVeg, Planter and VegPlotter work in both hemispheres. Gardenate covers six countries, including Australia and New Zealand.
Which garden planner has a proper phone app?
Grow To Eat, Planter and Gardenate all have native iPhone and Android apps, and VegPlotter has apps alongside its browser tool. GrowVeg and the Almanac Garden Planner run in a browser, which matters most when you are standing in the garden rather than sitting at a desk.
Do any of them warn you about crop rotation?
GrowVeg and the Almanac Garden Planner do it inside the layout, and VegPlotter offers rotation guidance as you place crops. Grow To Eat does not — there is no rotation warning in the app today, and if that is the deciding feature, the layout planners are the better answer.
What happens if I sow two weeks late?
In Grow To Eat every later date moves with you: potting on, planting out and the harvest window are all worked out from the day you actually sowed, and the weekly list updates. In the layout tools you can edit the dates yourself, and in GrowVeg you can set custom sowing and harvest times per variety — the difference is whether you have to do it by hand.
What should a vegetable garden planner cost in 2026?
Between nothing and about $50. Gardenate is free, VegPlotter is $22 to $35, Planter is $24.99 a year or $99.99 once, GrowVeg is $35 a year, and Grow To Eat Premium is 44.99 euros a year with everything above still free. Check what the free tier leaves out before paying for any of them.
Which is best for a first vegetable garden?
Grow To Eat, because the part a beginner needs most — what to sow, when, and what to do next — is the part that is free and uncapped, and every crop carries a full growing guide. If working out where things go is the harder question for you, draw the beds in Planter or VegPlotter for nothing first.
Grow To Eat works out the next step for every crop you sow.
Free sowing plans and full A–Z growing guides. No credit card required.
Head-to-head comparisons
Grow To Eat vs Almanac Garden PlannerA phone app for helping you grow food day by day or a desktop garden design tool — and which one fits the way you grow your food in your garden.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs GardenateGrow To Eat tells you what to sow now and what to step-by-step and advice for 120+ crops vs a free monthly garden calendar of what you can sow now.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs GardenizeGrow To Eat tells you what to sow and when — 120+ crops, free vs a journal app helping you keep track of all the plants in your garden.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs GrowVegA phone app for helping you grow food day by day or a desktop garden design tool — and which one fits the way you grow your food in your garden.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs PlantaGrow To Eat tells you what to sow and when — 120+ crops, free vs a plant care app that waters and feeds your indoor and garden plants.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs PlanterGrow To Eat has a free todo list from sowing to harvest vs a cheaper premium tier and more visual for laying out beds — but it is not as useful once the growing starts.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs Seed to SpoonSimilar-sized libraries, very different reach: US zip codes against dates built from your own location.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs SeedtimeClosely matched on features, but Grow To Eat costs about half as much with no caps on free tier features.Read comparison →Grow To Eat vs VegPlotterGrow To Eat gives you a weekly plan from sowing to harvest for free. VegPlotter is cheaper to buy, but the jobs list is monthly and ticking it off is in paid tier.Read comparison →
Last updated: September 2026