Nine of the Best AI Apps and Tools for Gardeners
Whether it’s a fingernail-sized urban oasis or a garden designed to save you from the zombie apocalypse (or something in between), growing a garden at home is a lot of fun, but it’s also a lot of work. Of course, it’s worth it: Beyond the natural beauty and fresh produce you can get from your own garden, gardening has a host of physical, emotional, and mental health benefits. That’s assuming your garden is thriving , of course.
If you have a “brown hand” and your gardening efforts always end up in a flower graveyard, you may not be getting these benefits. If this describes you, the missing ingredient to your gardening triumph may be technology: There are plenty of AI-powered apps and tools to help you with everything from planning to garden maintenance. If you’re struggling to maintain a green garden, check out these AI-powered apps and tools you can use in your own garden.
Planning tools
If you’ve never done any serious gardening before, or just need help planning your space, plant types, and placement, there are a few tools that can make the process easier:
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VegPlotter is a simple, easy-to-use app that’s perfect for those who find it difficult to use complex, feature-rich tools. You create a simple map of your garden, choose what you’ll grow, and the app tracks your growth and harvest calendar. It’ll even alert you if you don’t have enough space for your chosen plants. Cost: Free for up to 40 plantings; $22 or $35 per year for additional options.
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Planter is an alternative garden planner that’s easy to use: Just drag and drop cute little plant images onto a grid representing your garden. Planter automatically figures out how many grid squares each plant needs, making planning easy. Cost: Free, $24.99 per year, or $99 for a lifetime subscription.
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Garden Planner is a good choice if you need to plan not only plants but also paths, fences, and other landscaping elements. It’s not as user-friendly as VegPlotter or Planter, but it’s relatively simple. Cost: $48 after a 15-day free trial.
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Smart Gardener is a great tool if you want to feed yourself and your family with vegetables from your own garden. It will ask you how many people you have, what region you live in, and other basic information to help you plan what to grow and when you can harvest. Cost: $15 for 90 days; $40 for a year.
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Seed to Spoon offers a variety of tools for planning and maintaining your garden, including a detailed companion plant guide to help you stand out. The app will tell you which plants will go well together, making it easy to find a harmonious selection. Cost: Free version includes 10 plants for free, $4.99 for 1 month, $24.99 for 6 months, and $46.99 for a year.
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PictureThis is a simple but powerful plant identification tool. With just a quick photo of any plant, you’ll know what it is, assess its relative health, and get care information. Essential if you’re replanting an existing garden, ” cleaning ” one out of the garden, or waking up to find invaders sprouting up in your yard. Cost: Free.
Keeping a journal
A garden is a living thing, and all living things change over time. Keeping a garden journal is a crucial aspect of gardening because it allows you to keep track of what you’ve grown, how your harvest has been, and what’s working and not working in your yard. Of course, you can track all of this with a variety of tools (some of the apps listed here include this feature, and pen and paper are always handy), but Gardenize is a simple garden journal tool that makes it easy to enter information about your garden. It automatically timestamps all your actions and makes it easy to track the impact of your decisions over time. Cost: $8.99 per month, $3.74 per month for 12 months, or $6.66 per month for three months.
All in one
Sometimes you don’t need a bunch of apps that do specific things – you need one app that does it all:
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Seedtime is a comprehensive gardening app that many gardeners swear by . It includes almost everything you need, from a harvest and planting calendar based on the list of plants you want to grow to planning, scheduling, and journaling tools. It even tracks your seeds, fertilizer, and other supplies, and lets you know when they’re running low or need refilling. Cost: Free for a limited version, $7 a month for a basic subscription, or $9 for an unlimited subscription.
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Growbot AI is a general-purpose AI tool that’s basically like ChatGPT, but for gardening. You can ask it any questions you want and get a natural-language response, including specific numbers and timelines if applicable. However, it’s only available on iOS, so Android users may have a hard time using a more general-purpose AI chatbot to answer your questions. Cost: Free or $29.99 per year.