Virginia Beach city, in Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Virginia Beach city lies within the Hampton Roads / Coastal Southeast Virginia and Tidewater & Chesapeake — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Virginia Beach city holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Virginia Beach city, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Virginia Beach city — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Virginia Beach city — the short answer
Virginia Beach city, Virginia: USDA zone 8b, about 278 days between hard freezes, across 157K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~278
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 157K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 8b is Virginia Beach city's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Virginia Beach city's 278-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Virginia Beach city
Across a year, Virginia Beach city accumulates about 4,621 growing degree days above 50°F, about 887 more than the middle Virginia county — ahead of 130 of Virginia’s 133 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Winter banks about 1,497 hours below 45°F, 941 fewer than the Virginia middle of 2,438. Chill is what tells a fruit tree its dormancy is over, and it is set by climate rather than by anything you can build.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Virginia Beach County
Across Virginia Beach County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Acredale, Tomotley, and Nimmo are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 4.6–5.6, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B/D soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
11%
Hydric soils
67%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Virginia Beach city
The USDA soil survey maps 37% of Virginia Beach city as poorly drained — but another 38% drains differently: 16% very poorly drained, 8% moderately well drained.
Acredale is the most extensive named soil at 28% of mapped acres, then Tomotley (10%) and Nimmo (8%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Virginia Beach city
Each reading below is measured for Virginia Beach city itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Virginia Beach city are poorly drained, in hydrologic group B/D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Virginia Beach city runs about pH 4.6–5.6, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredVirginia Beach city runs about 278 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredVirginia Beach city sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Virginia Beach city is in
Virginia Beach city sits in the Middle Atlantic Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Virginia Beach city
We scored all 1,086 plants against Virginia Beach city's own USDA zone 8b and its own 278-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Virginia profile.
Is it too late to plant in Virginia Beach city?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 7 — 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 Virginia Beach city
Spotted lanternfly documented 28 miles from Virginia Beach city, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle4 documented records
- monarch butterfly148 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Virginia Beach city
USGS estimates 25,683 lb of Glyphosate on Virginia Beach city farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (11,117 lb) and Atrazine (10,241 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Virginia Beach County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Virginia Beach County — 1,185 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 7 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Virginia Beach County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Virginia Beach city
Closest first, across Virginia Beach County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AMAZON COM SERVICES LLC – ORF4Brownfields · 2200 ft
- COASTAL CREATIONSBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- AMAZON COM SERVICES LLC - DRC6Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- Taylor FarmsUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- H & T SERVICES, LLC.Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- RENTAL DEPOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- CLASSIC COLLISIONBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Miller Mart #58Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- OCEANA SENSOR TECHBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- 7 Eleven #38162Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- EXXON CO USA #28424Brownfields · 1.2 mi
- Harris Teeter #467Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Virginia Beach city'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 Virginia Beach city.
Sources Checked
across Virginia Beach County
Severity Distribution
across Virginia Beach County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Virginia Beach city
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 Virginia Beach city average
Your land is one point inside Virginia Beach city
Everything above resolves to Virginia Beach city as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 157K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Virginia Beach city Average
Virginia Beach city Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Virginia Beach city
- ●One soil character for all of Virginia Beach city
- ●Frost dates read at Virginia Beach city's scale: Mar 4 to Dec 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Virginia Beach city's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Virginia Beach city
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Virginia Beach city, Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Virginia Beach city averages can't show:
We read public map data around Virginia Beach city — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Virginia Beach city average
How we know this about Virginia Beach city
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Virginia Beach city carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Virginia Beach city
When does frost risk typically end in Virginia Beach city?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Virginia Beach city typically lands around Mar 4, 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 Mar 25.
How long is the growing season in Virginia Beach city?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Virginia Beach city sees about 278 frost-free days — roughly Mar 4 through Dec 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 25 to Nov 23, about 243 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Virginia Beach city?
The federal record around Virginia Beach city is a meaningful one — 1,185 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (725), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.4 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
Everything above is measured at Virginia Beach city's scale — its 8b band and its 278-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Virginia Beach city's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Virginia's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Virginia Beach city’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Virginia Beach city's own scale — its own ~278-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 1,185 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Virginia Beach city's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Virginia Beach city's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~278-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Virginia Beach cityUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 1,185 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 0.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Virginia Beach city's boundary and the 156,621 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~278-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Virginia Beach city sitting wholly inside the Middle Atlantic Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Virginia Beach city for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Virginia Beach city farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Virginia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Virginia
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Virginia Beach city — the ~278 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Virginia Beach city's 156,621 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 1,185 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Virginia Beach cityread your own land →