Growli Plus
What's wrong with my plant?
Photograph the sick part and Growli reads the symptom from the leaves, asks the two or three things it needs to know, and tells you what to change. Free to download; photo diagnosis is part of Growli Plus, free for 7 days.
What the diagnosis actually does
Reads the symptom, not just the species
Photograph the affected leaves and Growli names what it is seeing — yellowing between the veins, brown crispy margins, soft blackened stem, spotting with a halo — and works from that rather than from the plant alone.
Asks the questions that separate identical-looking causes
This is the part most one-shot photo apps skip. Brown leaf edges are underwatering, salt build-up from fertiliser, or root rot, and a photo looks much the same in all three. Growli asks how often you water, whether the pot drains, and how long it has been happening — because the answer changes what you do next.
Answers in the context of your home
The same symptom means different things in a north-facing London flat in February and a Texas patio in July. Growli already knows your location, your zone or RHS rating, and the local weather, and it uses them.
Tells you when it is not the app you need
Some problems are not diagnosable from a photo — root disease below the soil line, a pot that has never drained, or a plant already too far gone. Growli says so instead of guessing, and where a plant is toxic or the situation involves a pet, it points at the ASPCA-sourced answer rather than improvising.
Where it will not help
Worth knowing before you pay for anything:
- A photo cannot see roots. If the symptom points below the soil line, the next step is to unpot and look — no app can do that part for you.
- Distinguishing one fungal pathogen from another by eye is genuinely hard, and an app that names a specific pathogen confidently every time is telling you more than it knows.
- Anything involving a pet that has actually eaten something is a vet question, not an app question. Our pet pages exist to tell you whether to worry, not to replace the call.
Read the answer first, if you prefer
The species-level information the diagnosis runs on is free to read, and if you already know your plant it is often faster: diagnose by symptom, common problems by species, or compare what the apps in this category actually do in the diagnosis apps, tested.
Questions people ask
Can an app really tell what's wrong with my plant?
For the common causes, yes — overwatering, underwatering, light problems, nutrient burn, the frequent pests — because those have visible, distinguishable signatures. For anything rooted below the soil line, or for telling one fungal pathogen from another, a photo is not enough and you should treat a confident answer with suspicion.
Is plant diagnosis free in Growli?
The free tier covers your garden plan, weather-timed care tasks, frost alerts and the growing guides, and it does not expire. Photo identification and photo diagnosis are part of Growli Plus — £34.99 a year in the UK or $44.99 in the US, with a 7-day free trial on the yearly plan.
What do I photograph?
The affected part, close enough to fill the frame, in daylight rather than under a lamp. If the whole plant is drooping, include one shot of the whole plant and one of the worst leaf — the pattern across the plant is often more diagnostic than any single leaf.
What if I do not know what the plant is?
Growli identifies it from the same photo, so you do not need to know first. That matters more than it sounds: most symptom advice is species-specific, and yellowing on a monstera means something different from yellowing on a snake plant.