Last Updated on September 13, 2026
How Many Tomato Plants per Square Foot?
1 tomato plant per square foot if you prune indeterminate tomatoes to a single stem and grow them up a string or stake, which is how I grow them. Left unpruned, a tomato is a 2 x 2 foot bush and the chart gives it four squares.
The spacing pattern
| Square foot method | 1 per square (single-stem pruned); 1 per 4 squares unpruned; determinate types about 4 per square foot |
|---|---|
| 4 x 4 bed (16 squares) | 16 (pruned) or 4 (unpruned) tomato plants |
| 4 x 8 bed (32 squares) | 32 (pruned) or 8 (unpruned) tomato plants |
Pruning to one stem is what makes the difference. A single-stem tomato is a tall, narrow plant: all the energy goes into one vine and the fruit on it, the plant needs almost no ground space, and you can walk the row and see every tomato. Unpruned plants sprawl into their neighbors and shade each other.
Planting the square
- Put the support up first: a stake or a string trellis, before the plant goes in.
- Set one transplant per square, deep, with the lowest leaves removed, once nights are reliably warm.
- Pinch every sucker that forms in a leaf axil and tie the main stem to the support as it grows.
Tim’s growing notes
How I prune to a single stem and why it gets tomatoes earlier is in How to Prune Tomato Plants. The support systems are in the Florida weave and How to Build a String Trellis, and if you have no bed at all, tomatoes in containers.
Soil temperature for germination
From my Seed Germination Temperature Chart: tomatoes germinate from 50°F, do best at 65-85°F, and stop above 95°F.
Days for seedlings to emerge at different soil temperatures, from the same chart:
| Soil temperature | Days to emerge |
|---|---|
| 59°F | 14 days |
| 68°F | 8 days |
| 77°F | 6 days |
| 86°F | 6 days |
When to plant tomatoes
These are the windows the Plan My Garden planner uses, counted from your average last spring frost. Enter your frost date on the seed starting calendar to turn them into dates. I transplant deep, with most of the stem buried, so the plant roots along it.
| Start indoors | 5 weeks before to 3 weeks before your last frost |
|---|---|
| Transplant out | 2 weeks after to 3 weeks after your last frost |
| Days to maturity | about 80 days |
How I grow them, in brief
The plant has a main stem, branches, and suckers that grow in the joint between them. On indeterminate tomatoes I pinch every sucker and grow one stem up a stake or string, which gives me earlier fruit, a plant I can see through, and one plant per square foot. Determinate types stay bushy and get about four per square foot on the Florida weave. The stake goes in at planting, at least three feet tall, and I tie the stem as it climbs. Lower leaves come off for airflow, and toward the end of the season I snip the growing tips so the plant ripens what it has. Pruning is in How to Prune Tomato Plants, the supports in How to Support Tomato Plants, and the planting itself in How to Transplant Tomatoes.
Where I get seed
Wood Prairie’s organic tomato seed includes Brandywine, Cherokee Purple, Amish Paste and Black Cherry, and the Sweetie cherry I wrote about. Code PMG5 takes 5 percent off.
Quick questions
How many tomato plants in a 4 x 8 bed?
Up to 32 pruned to a single stem, but 8 to 12 is what most families actually want; put the rest of the bed into peppers, lettuce and herbs.
Cherry tomatoes, same spacing?
Yes if you prune them. Unpruned cherry tomatoes sprawl even more than slicers.
Let the planner place them
Plan My Garden is free to start: draw your beds, pick tomatoes and everything else you want to grow, and it places each plant at the right spacing and gives you a planting schedule for your zip code.
Related: Square Foot Gardening Chart · How to Prune Tomato Plants · Seed Starting Calendar
