Newburyport, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
You’re in North Shore
The settled coast north of Boston — salt air, tidy town lots, and sea-tempered winters that hold the cold off a little longer than the hills inland. Wind and salt spray are the near-shore gardener's companions here.
Even in Newburyport, 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 Newburyport 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 Newburyport — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Newburyport — the short answer
Newburyport, Massachusetts: USDA zone 6b, about 204 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~204
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 5K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 6b is Newburyport's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Newburyport's 204-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Newburyport
Each reading below is measured for Newburyport itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNewburyport runs about 204 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredNewburyport sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Newburyport is in
Newburyport sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Newburyport's own centroid rather than borrowed from Essex County.
What Grows in Newburyport
Every plant below cleared Newburyport's own zone 6b and its 204-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Newburyport?
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 Mar 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 12 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 2 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Newburyport
Spotted lanternfly documented 8 miles from Newburyport, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Newburyport
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Newburyport. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ANNA JAQUES HOSPITALBrownfields · 1500 ft
- ANNA JAQUES HOSPITALUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- MASS GENERAL BRIGHAM UROLOGY NEWBURYPORTBrownfields · 1600 ft
- NORTHEAST DERMATOLOGY ASSOCIATES NEWBURYPORTBrownfields · 1600 ft
- ULTRACLAD CORPORATIONBrownfields · 1800 ft
- CITY OF NEWBURYPORT DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SERVICESBrownfields · 1900 ft
- TOWLE MANUFACTURING COToxics Release Inventory · 2300 ft
- DIANNES FINE DESSERTSBrownfields · 2300 ft
- HARBORSIDE PRINTING COBrownfields · 2400 ft
- Newburyport One StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- LOMBARDI OIL COMPANY INCBrownfields · 2500 ft
- MERRIMAC CORPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Newburyport'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 Newburyport.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Newburyport
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Newburyport
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Newburyport, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Newburyport — Superfund (17 sites) and PFAS (10 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Newburyport
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 Newburyport average
Your land is one point inside Newburyport
Everything above resolves to Newburyport as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 5K acres. 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 Newburyport Average
Newburyport Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Newburyport
- ●One soil character for all of Newburyport
- ●Frost dates read at Newburyport's scale: Apr 12 to Nov 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Newburyport's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Newburyport
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Newburyport, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Newburyport averages can't show:
We read public map data around Newburyport — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Newburyport average
How we know this about Newburyport
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 Newburyport’s own record; 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 Newburyport
When does frost risk typically end in Newburyport?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Newburyport typically lands around Apr 12, 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 May 3.
When is the first frost in Newburyport?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Newburyport typically arrives around Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 19, so the watching starts about Oct 3 — about 204 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Newburyport?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Newburyport sees about 204 frost-free days — roughly Apr 12 through Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 3 to Oct 19, about 169 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Newburyport?
The federal record around Newburyport runs heavier than most — 883 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (459), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.3 miles 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 Newburyport?
From about Oct 3 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 Nov 2 (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 Nov 2. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Newburyport's scale — its 6b band and its 204-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Newburyport'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 Newburyport’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Newburyport's own scale — its own ~204-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,344 acres it covers and 883 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Newburyport's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Newburyport's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 12 and Nov 2 and the ~204-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 883 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Newburyport, the closest Brownfields record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Newburyport's boundary and the 5,344 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~204-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Newburyport's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Newburyportlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Newburyport's 5,344 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Essex County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Essex County
- The growing challenges every Massachusetts grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Massachusetts
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Essex County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Newburyport's 5,344 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Newburyport you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,344 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.3 miles 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 Newburyport-wide figureread your own land →
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