Gardenstead vs GrowSmart
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Gardenstead
Connect with fellow plant enthusiasts, share gardening tips, and discover local communities. Track your garden's progress, get inspired by design ideas, and learn sustainable growing practices from real gardeners.
- Connect with gardeners worldwide
- Track gardening progress
- Get practical gardening tips
- Join local gardening communities
- Swap seeds with neighbors
- Explore garden design inspiration
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Gardenstead – Your Gardening Community Gardenstead is more than just a gardening app. It’s a place to connect with gardeners everywhere. Whether you’re growing vegetables in your backyard, planting flowers on your balcony, or keeping herbs on your windowsill, you’ll find ideas, advice, and community support to help your plants thrive. Grow your garden, your way From sowing seeds to harvesting vegetables, Gardenstead makes it easy to track your gardening life and get practical tips from real people. Learn how to care for your lawn, design your yard, grow indoor plants, or plan a vegetable patch with the same simplicity you’d expect from a trusted gardening guide. Connect with your neighborhood Join local communities and discover nearby gardeners who share your passion. Gardenstead helps you meet like-minded people, swap seeds, and even find community projects. You can also create your own group tailored to your needs. Whether that’s balcony gardening, organic vegetables, lawn care, or sustainable growing. Build a community around the plants you love and invite others to join. Tools and inspiration - Explore gardening feeds from friends, neighbors, and global gardeners - Get inspired by garden design, deck planner layouts, yard design projects, or balcony gardening ideas - Browse curated events and seasonal tips tailored to your zone Sustainable & ecological growing Gardenstead is all about mindful gardening. Learn how to grow your plants in sustainable, ecological ways. Whether it’s vegetables, herbs, flowers, balcony gardens, or even a small adorable garden, you’ll find tips that help you grow greener and smarter. Real advice from real gardeners The questions platform lets you ask anything! From “How do I sow burpee seeds indoors?” to “What’s the best way to keep plants healthy on a balcony?” You’ll get real answers from practitioners who know the challenges firsthand. Why Gardenstead? - Social platform for gardening content - Content feeds: friends, neighborhood, and global gardening news - Seed Swap & gardeners around you: find & exchange seeds with people in your location - Q&A with gardeners in your community - Local groups and events for inspiration - Create your own groups and communities for the plants and topics that matter to you - Support for everything: lawn care, seed sowing, planter ideas, balcony gardening, yard planning, vegetable growing, and more Gardenstead works whether you’re caring for indoor plants, experimenting with balcony gardening, starting with one planter, or planning a full landscape design. It’s built for people who want to grow, share, and make gardening part of everyday life. Join the global gardening community Millions of people use gardening apps, but Gardenstead focuses on real connections and local communities. Find gardeners near you, share your plant journey, create your own group, and grow together. Download Gardenstead today, plant the seeds of connection, and let’s grow together. Privacy Policy: https://www.gardenstead.com/privacy-policy/ Terms: https://www.api.gardenstead.com/static/termsOfService/
GrowSmart
This app helps you plan and manage your garden from seed to harvest. It provides personalized planting schedules, to-do lists, and crop rotation memory. Features include raised bed layout, companion planting advice, and AI assistance for gardening questions.
- Personalized planting schedules
- Raised bed layout tool
- Crop rotation memory
- Companion planting matrix
- Weekly garden to-do list
- AI garden assistant (Pro + Sage)
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Grow your own groceries, from spring seeds to fall harvest. GrowSmart plans your garden beds, tells you what to do each week, and remembers what grew where, so next spring starts with last year's history. Start planning for free. Add up to 10 plants and get your spring planting schedule, plus fall garlic and shallots. Upgrade to Pro for unlimited plants, summer and fall schedules, succession planting and the full companion matrix. No account, email or credit card required to start. WHAT YOU GET • Your plants, not a short list. 251 vegetables, herbs, fruit and flowers, including garlic, strawberries and tomatillos. Can't find yours? Add your own plant and GrowSmart schedules it. • Timed for where you garden. Planting dates use 1991 to 2020 climate normals from nearby weather stations, with your USDA hardiness zone, in °F or °C. • Your season at a glance. Every sow, transplant and harvest window on one timeline: spring on the free plan, spring to fall on Pro. • A to-do list for the garden. This Week shows what to sow, transplant, water, feed and harvest. Finish a whole group of tasks with one tap. • Your garden is saved. It saves on your phone as you go and works offline. Sign in for free to sync it across your devices. RAISED BED PLANNER, DRAWN TO SCALE Lay out raised beds, rows and containers with drag and drop. GrowSmart shows the spacing each plant needs and how many fit per square foot, and flags poor companions and crops that come back to the same spot too soon. One bed on the free plan, unlimited beds on Pro. CROP ROTATION MEMORY (INCLUDED FREE) GrowSmart remembers what grew in every square. Start a new year and your beds are saved to History, and the planner warns you before you plant the same crop family in the same spot within two years. Garlic and shallots planted in fall stay in place. COMPANION PLANTING WITH REASONS See which plants help each other, which conflict, and why. Reasons are checked against university extension sources. Basic companion info on the free plan, the full matrix on Pro. SUCCESSION PLANTING (PRO) Repeat sowings of lettuce, beans, radishes and other quick crops are scheduled for you, so the harvest keeps coming. WHERE THE DATES COME FROM NOAA and Environment Canada 1991 to 2020 climate normals from nearby stations. Local conditions can vary. SHARE YOUR PLAN Share any bed as a picture of your planner, ready to send by Messages or email. SAGE, YOUR AI GARDEN ASSISTANT (PRO + SAGE) Ask garden questions in plain language. Sage knows your city, your planting calendar, what is in each bed and what grew there last year. Try 3 questions free with a free account. PLANS Free: up to 10 plants and one bed, the spring schedule, fall garlic and shallots, and crop rotation memory. Pro: plan your whole growing season. Unlimited plants, spring, summer and fall schedules, repeat sowings to keep harvesting longer, and the full companion planting matrix. Pro + Sage: everything in Pro, plus Sage with 50 questions a month. Subscriptions renew automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Manage or cancel them in your App Store account settings. Built in Ontario by a Canadian gardener. Terms of Use: https://getgrowsmart.com/terms Privacy Policy: https://getgrowsmart.com/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: GrowSmart at 5.0 against Gardenstead's 4.2. GrowSmart also leads on ads (none vs shown) and update cadence (every 4 days vs fortnightly). Gardenstead's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 6) and ratings volume (10 vs 1). On price, monetization model, device support and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. GrowSmart sells 6 in-app purchases, starting at $2.00 per month. Gardenstead asks for nothing beyond the download.
GrowSmart holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.2. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Gardenstead has 10 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
Gardenstead ships an update fortnightly, GrowSmart every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on November 4, 2026 and November 5, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Gardenstead | GrowSmart |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.2 (10 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 68.8% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 10 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Fortnightly | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Freemium |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 | 15.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 246 MB | 73 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Gardenstead | Amanda Holt |
Customer experience
Gardenstead
GrowSmart
In-app purchases
Gardenstead
No in-app purchases
GrowSmart
- Sage Add-On (Monthly)$2.001 Month
- Pro (Monthly)$3.991 Month
- Pro + Sage (Monthly)$5.991 Month
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- Sage Add-On (Yearly)$15.001 Year
- Pro (Yearly)1 Month trial$29.001 Year
- Pro + Sage (Yearly)1 Month trial$44.991 Year









