Square Foot Garden Planner

Square foot gardening divides a raised bed into a grid of one-foot squares, and each square holds a set number of plants based on that vegetable's mature size and spacing needs. The square foot garden planner lays out the whole bed at once, assigning squares among the vegetables, fruits, and herbs chosen for the season and showing the resulting plant counts before anything goes in the ground.

Standard square foot garden beds run 4 feet wide, in lengths such as 4x4, 4x8, or 4x12, with width and length accepting fractions (1/2) and decimals (3.5). More than 65 vegetables, fruits, and herbs carry correct square foot gardening spacing, and each square-allocation entry shows how many plants of that vegetable fit in one square before the layout is generated. The resulting plan reports total squares available, total plants, and remaining open squares, along with a plant breakdown table listing spacing category and total count per vegetable and a top-down grid showing which vegetable occupies each square foot cell.

Settings can add harvest day estimates to the breakdown table and display a spacing reference guide showing how many plants fit per square for each size category.

Spacing follows Mel Bartholomew's square foot gardening method: extra-large plants like tomatoes and squash get 1 per square, medium plants like lettuce get 4 per square, small plants like carrots get 9 per square, and tiny plants like green onions get 16 per square. Taller vegetables belong on the north side of the bed so they do not shade shorter plants.

A 4-by-4-foot bed holds 16 one-foot squares. Filled entirely with lettuce at 4 plants per square, that bed holds 64 lettuce plants. Filled entirely with carrots at 9 plants per square, the same 16 squares hold 144 carrots.

Garden layouts of any size benefit from accurate plant counts and a visual grid, useful for beginners learning square foot gardening and experienced growers managing multiple beds.

• Beginner Gardening: A simple 4x4 bed split evenly among three or four vegetables shows exactly how many plants to buy or start from seed for the season.
• Urban and Balcony Gardening: A compact 2x4 or 3x3 raised bed makes the most of limited space when its squares go to high-yield vegetables like lettuce, radishes, and herbs.
• Succession Planting: Squares assigned to fast-growing crops such as radishes (25 to 30 days to harvest) or lettuce (30 to 60 days) free up for a second planting within the same season.
• School and Community Gardens: A 4x12 bed holds 48 squares, enough to divide among multiple vegetable types and give each group or class in a larger garden a clear planting assignment.
• Companion Planting: The grid layout shows which vegetables sit next to each other, so compatible plants can share adjacent squares while incompatible ones stay at opposite ends of the bed.
• Season Planning: Harvest day estimates help coordinate planting schedules: spring crops with 30 to 60 day harvests can run alongside summer crops with 60 to 90 day harvests to keep production continuous through the season.
• Seed and Transplant Budgeting: Exact plant counts settle seed and transplant orders before purchase: a 4x8 bed with 6 squares of carrots needs 54 carrot seeds, not an imprecise estimate from a seed packet.