Work out which crop actually pays

Pick a crop, set how many plots you farm and how long you plan to leave the garden running, and the calculator returns the numbers that matter: harvests, gross Sheckles, seed cost, net profit, and profit per hour — plus the five most profitable crops at those exact settings.

That last panel is the reason to use it. Most Grow a Garden advice compares crops by sell price, which is the wrong metric: an expensive crop that takes an hour to mature can easily lose to a cheap one that regrows every few seconds. Profit per hour is the number that decides how fast your Sheckle balance actually climbs.

How the calculator works

Three inputs drive everything:

Crop loads that crop’s seed cost, average sell value, grow time, and whether it regrows after harvest.

Plots multiplies your throughput. This is why the “best” crop changes with account size — a crop that is marginal on 5 plots can dominate on 50, because seed cost scales linearly while your attention does not.

Time window decides how many harvest cycles fit. Short windows favour fast-growing crops; long overnight windows favour multi-harvest crops that keep producing without a replant.

The output subtracts seed cost from gross rather than reporting gross alone, which is where a lot of community crop rankings quietly mislead — a high-value crop with an expensive seed can net less than a cheap one.

Where the crop data comes from

Every number in the tool is sourced, not estimated. The dataset was verified against growagarden.fandom.com — the wiki’s Module:Crop Data plus the individual crop pages, pulled through the MediaWiki API — and stamped with the date it was checked.

One honest caveat about sell values: the wiki’s figure is the average-weight price. Grow a Garden rolls a weight for each fruit, and heavier fruit sells for more, so your real payout varies around that average. Over dozens of harvests it evens out, which is exactly the scale this calculator works at — but a single lucky heavyweight harvest can beat the projection, and a single runt can miss it.

Why per-hour beats gross profit

If you take one thing from this page, take this: rank crops by Sheckles per hour, not by sell price.

A crop that sells for 200 but takes twenty minutes to mature earns less than a crop that sells for 30 and regrows every thirty seconds. The second crop also compounds better, because you are reinvesting sooner. The Top 5 panel already sorts by this, so the fastest way to use the page is to set your real plot count and time window, then just farm whatever sits at the top.

Multi-harvest crops change the maths

Some crops are single-harvest — you plant, you pick, the plot is empty. Others regrow on a timer and keep producing from the same planting. The calculator accounts for this, and it is the single biggest source of surprise in the results.

Multi-harvest crops look mediocre in a one-hour window and excellent in a twelve-hour one, because you pay the seed cost once and collect repeatedly. If you play in long sessions or leave the game running, drag the time slider out and watch the ranking reshuffle — the crop you should be planting overnight is usually not the one you should plant for a quick twenty-minute session.

Tips to raise your Sheckles per hour

  • Fill every plot. Idle plots are the most common and most expensive mistake; the calculator assumes full usage.
  • Match the crop to your session length, not to a generic “best crop” list — that is what the time slider is for.
  • Reinvest into plots before chasing rare seeds. Plot count multiplies every future harvest; a single expensive seed does not.
  • Re-check after updates. The developer adjusts crop values and grow times, and we re-verify the dataset against the wiki when that happens.

Frequently asked questions

What is the most profitable crop in Grow a Garden?

It depends on your plot count and how long you play in one sitting — that is exactly why this page is a calculator rather than a fixed list. Set your real plots and time window and read the Top 5 panel.

Are the sell values exact?

They are the wiki’s average-weight values. Grow a Garden randomises fruit weight, so individual harvests land above or below the projection; across many harvests the average holds.

Does the calculator include seed cost?

Yes. It reports gross, seed cost, and net separately, because a high-value crop with an expensive seed can net less than a cheap fast one.

Why does the best crop change when I move the time slider?

Because multi-harvest crops regrow. Over a short window they only harvest once, but over a long window they keep producing from a single seed purchase, which pushes them up the ranking.