Minneapolis, Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
The conditions favor cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Minneapolis, 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 Minneapolis 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 Minneapolis — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Minneapolis — the short answer
Minneapolis, Minnesota: USDA zone 5a, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 35K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 35K 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 5a is Minneapolis's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Minneapolis's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Minneapolis
Each reading below is measured for Minneapolis itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMinneapolis runs about 200 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
MeasuredMinneapolis sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 Minneapolis is in
Minneapolis sits in the North Central Hardwood Forests — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Minneapolis's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hennepin County.
What Grows in Minneapolis
Every plant below cleared Minneapolis's own zone 5a and its 200-day season. Each card opens that plant's Minnesota profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Minneapolis?
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 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 27 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
What's on the federal record near Minneapolis
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Minneapolis. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Portland MobilUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- Total MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- MINNEAPOLIS COMMUNITY DEVELOPBrownfields · 600 ft
- BREAK AWAY INCBrownfields · 850 ft
- PAST PRESENT FUTUREBrownfields · 850 ft
- NORTHERN XRAY CO INCBrownfields · 900 ft
- OAK GROVE CARE CENTER, OAK GROVEBrownfields · 900 ft
- INNER CITY CHRISTIAN MINISTRIESBrownfields · 950 ft
- Signal Systems IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- CYLINDER HEAD & MOTOR SUPPLY COBrownfields · 1100 ft
- BENEDICTINE HEALTH CENTER OF MINNEAPOLISBrownfields · 1100 ft
- THIRD AVE GROCERYBrownfields · 1200 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Minneapolis'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 Minneapolis.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Minneapolis
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Minneapolis
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Minneapolis, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 8,626 sites within ~10 miles of Minneapolis. 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 Minneapolis
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 Minneapolis average
Your land is one point inside Minneapolis
Everything above resolves to Minneapolis as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 35K 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 Minneapolis Average
Minneapolis Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Minneapolis
- ●One soil character for all of Minneapolis
- ●Frost dates read at Minneapolis's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Minneapolis's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Minneapolis
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Minneapolis, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Minneapolis averages can't show:
We read public map data around Minneapolis — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Minneapolis average
How we know this about Minneapolis
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 Minneapolis’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 Minneapolis
When does frost risk typically end in Minneapolis?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Minneapolis typically lands around Apr 10, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Minneapolis?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Minneapolis typically arrives around Oct 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 13, so the watching starts about Sep 27 — about 200 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Minneapolis?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Minneapolis sees about 200 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 13, about 165 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Minneapolis?
The federal record around Minneapolis runs heavier than most — 12,037 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (8,626), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Minneapolis?
From about Sep 27 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 Oct 27 (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 Oct 27. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Minneapolis's scale — its 5a band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Minneapolis'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 Minneapolis’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Minneapolis's own scale — its own ~200-day season between 28°F freezes, the 34,560 acres it covers and 12,037 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Minneapolis's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Minneapolis's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Oct 27 and the ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 12,037 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Minneapolis, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Minneapolis's boundary and the 34,560 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Minneapolis's own centroid, the North Central Hardwood ForestsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Minneapolis's 34,560 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hennepin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hennepin County
- The growing challenges every Minnesota grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Minnesota
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Hennepin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Minneapolis's 34,560 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Minneapolis you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 34,560 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Minneapolis-wide figureread your own land →