Milpitas, California, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
On paper, okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Milpitas, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Milpitas lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Milpitas — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Milpitas — the short answer
Milpitas, California: USDA zone 10a, about 331 days between hard freezes, across 9K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 10a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 17
- Santa Clara County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 14
- Santa Clara County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~331
- Santa Clara County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 9K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Santa Clara County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 10a is Milpitas's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Milpitas's 331-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Milpitas
Each reading below is measured for Milpitas itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsMilpitas runs about 331 days between hard freezes (read from Santa Clara County, the closest normal to Milpitas) — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredMilpitas sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Milpitas is in
Milpitas sits in the Central California Foothills and Coastal Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Mediterranean California. That is read at Milpitas's own centroid rather than borrowed from Santa Clara County.
What Grows in Milpitas
Every plant below cleared Milpitas's own zone 10a and its 331-day season. Each card opens that plant's California profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Milpitas?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 14 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the calendar nearly circles: cool-season crops take the winter shift, and the next window is always close.
Documented around Milpitas
Spotted lanternfly documented 29 miles from Milpitas, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Milpitas
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Milpitas. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- LESHELL INCBrownfields · 200 ft
- Leshell Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- SHELL SERVICE STATIONBrownfields · 350 ft
- KAISER PERMANENTEBrownfields · 400 ft
- BIG 5 SPORTING GOODS #123Brownfields · 800 ft
- WESTROCK CP LLCBrownfields · 950 ft
- COOK COMPOSITES & POLYMERS COBrownfields · 1100 ft
- COOK COMPOSITES & POLYMERS COToxics Release Inventory · 1100 ft
- ALEXANDER D GALANG DMD INCBrownfields · 1200 ft
- KAISER PERMANENTE MILPITAS 589 MEDICAL OFFICE BUILDINGBrownfields · 1200 ft
- STAPLES THE OFFICE SUPERSTORE EAST INC STORE 0358Brownfields · 1200 ft
- LOOMISBrownfields · 1400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Milpitas's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Milpitas.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Milpitas
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Milpitas
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Milpitas, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 7,581 sites within ~10 miles of Milpitas. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Milpitas
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Milpitas average
Your land is one point inside Milpitas
Everything above resolves to Milpitas as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 9K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Santa Clara County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’s own centroid. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at city scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Milpitas Average
Milpitas Average
- ●USDA Zones 10a, averaged across Milpitas
- ●One soil character for all of Milpitas
- ●Frost dates read at Milpitas's scale: Jan 17 to Dec 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Milpitas's 10a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Milpitas
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Milpitas, California — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Milpitas averages can't show:
We read public map data around Milpitas — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Milpitas average
How we know this about Milpitas
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Santa Clara County’s record, because none resolves here; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Milpitas
When does frost risk typically end in Milpitas?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Milpitas typically lands around Jan 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Feb 7.
When is the first frost in Milpitas?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Milpitas typically arrives around Dec 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 30, so the watching starts about Nov 14 — about 331 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Milpitas?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Milpitas sees about 331 frost-free days — roughly Jan 17 through Dec 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 7 to Nov 30, about 296 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Milpitas?
The federal record around Milpitas runs heavier than most — 8,534 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (7,581), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Milpitas?
From about Nov 14 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Dec 14 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Dec 14. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Milpitas's scale — its 10a band and its 331-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Milpitas's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Milpitas’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Milpitas's own scale — the 8,628 acres it covers and 8,534 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Milpitas's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 8,534 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Milpitas, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Milpitas's boundary and the 8,628 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 10a and a ~331-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Milpitas's own centroid, the Central California Foothills and Coastal MountainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Milpitaslydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Milpitas has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Santa Clara County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Milpitas's 8,628 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Santa Clara County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Santa Clara County
- The growing challenges every California grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom California
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Santa Clara County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Milpitas's 8,628 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Milpitas you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 8,628 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Milpitas-wide figureread your own land →
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