Lettuce planting calendar
When to plant lettuce — pick your state
Lettuce timing swings hard by climate — choose your state for sow, transplant, and harvest dates calibrated to its USDA zone and frost window.
Northeast
Southeast
Midwest
Southwest
West
Pacific
Not listed: Hawaii — the dominant climate zone there is outside lettuce's practical range, so a generic calendar would mislead more than it helps.
Common questions
When should I plant lettuce?
Lettuce is genuinely cold-hardy — direct-sow as soon as soil can be worked, 2-4 weeks before the last spring frost. It bolts and turns bitter in summer heat above 24 °C, so southern zones grow it as a winter and shoulder-season crop instead of in midsummer. Because the right window depends on your local frost dates, pick your US state above for a calendar with exact sow, transplant, and harvest dates.
Does the best time to plant lettuce vary by state?
Yes — planting dates swing by several weeks across the US because each state sits in a different USDA zone with its own frost window. Every state page here gives lettuce dates calibrated to that state's climate.
How are these lettuce planting dates calculated?
Each state's dates come from that state's dominant USDA hardiness zone and NOAA average frost dates, then adjusted for lettuce's cold tolerance and days to maturity.