ZoneSprout

When to plant Tomatoes Georgia Zone 8a

Georgia · USDA zone 8a

When to plant tomatoes in zone 8a, Georgia

Georgia zone 8a averages its last frost on 31 March and its first on 5 November — 221 days between them. Every window below is worked out from those two dates and from the 47 days a year this zone spends at or above 90°F.

Spring planting

Sow indoors3–17 February
Plant out7–21 April
Harvest1 June – 24 August

Fall planting

Sow indoors23 April – 7 May
Plant out25 June – 9 July
Harvest19 August – 5 November
This is metro Atlanta, and the July deadline is the thing to remember. UGA Extension gives middle Georgia a fall window of mid-June to mid-July and then caps it: nothing planted after 20 July will ripen before the frost. The dates below sit inside that. Worth knowing that Georgia’s reasoning here is not about heat at all — UGA counts backwards from the first frost, allowing days-to-maturity plus eighteen days of picking — which is why the window is earlier than you might expect from a state this warm.

Zone 8a is not zone 8a everywhere

21 states contain zone 8a. They share a coldest winter night and almost nothing else: the last frost spans 22 March to 4 May, and the number of days at or above 90°F runs from 0 to 112. A planting calendar that stops at “zone 8a” is giving all 21 the same advice.

Zone 8a, state by state. Georgia in bold.
StateLast frostFirst frostSeasonDays ≥90°F
UT 22 March 10 November 231 days 112
AR 26 March 6 November 227 days 69
DC 28 March 8 November 225 days 45
MS 28 March 5 November 223 days 66
MD 29 March 13 November 229 days 32
NJ 29 March 15 November 231 days 11
OK 29 March 6 November 223 days 84
TN 29 March 5 November 222 days 58
TX 29 March 7 November 225 days 105
AL 30 March 3 November 220 days 57
GA 31 March 5 November 221 days 47
NC 31 March 5 November 220 days 45
SC 31 March 4 November 219 days 56
VA 31 March 10 November 225 days 27
NM 3 April 5 November 216 days 106
NV 8 April 2 November 208 days 110
AZ 16 April 1 November 198 days 60
AK 18 April 31 October 192 days 0
WA 18 April 25 October 190 days 6
OR 2 May 15 October 166 days 28
CA 4 May 21 October 168 days 33

Other zones in Georgia: see all Georgia zones for tomatoes.

Where these dates come from

The frost dates for Georgia are NOAA’s 1991–2020 US Climate Normals — the 50% probability of a 32°F freeze, taken from weather stations standing inside zone 8a itself, not averaged across the state. The fall window follows UGA Extension Circular 963, vegetable planting chart. Everything else on this page is arithmetic on those two dates: the same inputs give the same answer every time.

Made only for gardeners in the United States

Your zone is one number about one winter night.

Every date above is worked out from Georgia’s own frost records and its summer heat, read together — which is why two gardens in the same zone can be a month apart. ZoneSprout does that for 2,700 plants, in every zone of every state, and tells you what to do this week.

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