Dec 23, 2025 5:30 AM

We Tried 11 of the Most Popular Indoor Gardening Systems

You can grow a backyard’s worth of greens and vegetables in your house with a vertical hydroponic garden. Here are a few that might be worth the investment.

Featured in this article

Best Overall

Gardyn Indoor Hydroponic Garden

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Most Dramatic-Looking

Lettuce Grow Farmstand

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Best Budget Option

LetPot LPH-SE Senior Hydroponic Growing System

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I'm a lifelong plant person. Even though I’ve spent many years in apartments or living situations where a full garden isn’t feasible, I’ve always tried to grow something, whether it’s a single basil plant on a windowsill, a Topsy-Turvy tomato, or a few basil sprigs in an old-school AeroGarden.

Several years ago, I moved to a house on a quarter-acre lot on the outer edge of town, where residential development rubs up against undeveloped wildland. “My gardening dreams are finally coming true!” I thought. It took only three seasons of hard clay soil, deer, and persistent rabbits to disabuse me of the notion that outdoor gardening was ever going to happen for me. My gardening endeavors had to be moved indoors. I’ve had various tiny LED planter setups since then, but the latest large-scale indoor vertical gardens have had me intrigued. The ability to grow 20, 30, or even 40 veggies and fresh herbs, year-round, in a space smaller than a bookshelf? Sign me up!

These gardens are definitely an investment in both time and maintenance, and they're all different in terms of what they can offer. The Gardyn Home 4.0 ($899), for example, offers total success with no green thumb required if you pay for a subscription, while the Rise 3 ($1,499) offers insanely high potential yields. How can you be sure which is the best indoor garden for your specific lifestyle? We tried some of the more popular systems on the market for two to four months each to see which ones are worth the money and hassle.

Check out our other home tech buying guides for people who like living organisms, like the Best Kitchen Composters, Best Smart Bird Feeders, and Best Automatic Litter Boxes.

Updated December 2025: We've added AeroGarden's Bounty and Harvest Lite models and a seed starter from LetPot, amended some long-term testing info, and ensured up-to-date links and prices.

Table of Contents

• Best Overall

  • Photograph: Kat Merck

  • Photograph: Kat Merck

  • Courtesy of Gardyn

  Gardyn

  Indoor Hydroponic Garden

  Gardyn Home 4.0 (read our full review here) had one of the easiest assemblies and setups out of the box and the most dramatic success of any of the brands I tried. Flowers, kohlrabi, thyme, even a whole cauliflower—all thrived in this pipe-based system with the lights in front to allow for taller plant growth.

  Part of the success is due to the subscription app add-on, “Kelby,” which monitors your plants (which grow in proprietary pods called yCubes) via attached sensors and cameras and delivers customized watering and lighting schedules, as well as maintenance suggestions. This subscription adds an additional $408 a year to the base purchase price (this includes a certain number of “credits” per month with which to buy yCube refills, depending on whether you have the Home or Studio model). While you can use the Gardyn without Kelby, if you want an indoor garden that's totally foolproof for beginners, it might be worth at least signing up for the free 30-day trial.

  Each Gardyn purchase comes with your choice of yCube sets: “Salad Lover,” “Budding Florist,” or “Chef Faves.” I've tried both “Budding Florist” and “Chef Faves,” and my favorite is the latter; it has an interesting variety of everything from breen and Toyko bekana greens to Thai basil and miniature sunflowers. Though Gardyn recommends starting the yCubes in the company's add-on $80 nursery, I've germinated plenty of yCubes right in the system just fine. (Make sure you don't add nutrients until they've sprouted.) The seeds arrive tucked in mineral wool, snug in their little yCubes that slot into larger cups ("yPods") that fit into the pipes. When the Gardyn waters the plants, the yPods fill with nutrient-infused water, and the plants' roots grow right into the water.

FAQs

What Are Hydroponics?

In the simplest terms, hydroponic gardening means to grow plants without roots in soil. Sometimes the plants are suspended in water, like in the Rise or Gardyn; sometimes they're in pods attached to a wick, like in the Click & Grow; and sometimes they have water sprayed or misted on their roots, like in the Lettuce Grow and Plantaform. Usually this is in concert with an artificial light source, either indoors or in an outdoor enclosure.

What Are the Benefits of Hydroponics?

In addition to the obvious plus of cleaner produce without mud, dirt, or synthetic pesticides, hydroponic systems use much less water than conventional growing methods, since all the water used is either recirculated or taken up by the plants. Some farmers also say they get higher yields from hydroponic systems, as the variables of weather, light, and nutrients are far easier to control. And, because of these variables, farmers are also able to grow varieties of plants from just about any season or region. And there are no weeds!

What Kinds of Things Can I Grow in a Hydroponic Garden?

Just about anything you can think of! I asked FX Rouxel, creator of Gardyn, if there was anything you couldn't grow in these systems, other than ground-dwelling plants like peanuts or potatoes. “All the things that have big roots,” he said—like carrots, parsnips, and so on. “Otherwise, mostly things that are too big, like apples or lemons.” So, there you have it: No long roots, no trees. But anything else is fair game to try.

What Are the Downsides of Hydroponics?

First of all, it's no secret hydroponic systems cost more than just planting some seeds outside in the dirt. Then you've got to worry about power outages, pump maintenance, algae, and just general maintenance. And if you're not careful, water can harbor some nasty stuff, even if that's just fertilizer, as WIRED reviewer Lisa Wood Shapiro found when she reviewed the Plantaform.

Will I Save Money By Growing My Own Vegetables?

In short, no. There are many ways to build your own hydroponic system with items from the hardware store. The ready-made systems simply remove a great deal of hassle and guesswork from the process, and usually look pretty cool in the process. It's also nice to have warranty and tech support in the event something goes wrong, and is often the case with anything filled with water, when something does go wrong, it goes really wrong.

How I Tested

I unboxed, assembled, and set up each garden exactly as described in the provided instructions, using the seeds, pods, or seedlings that came with the garden. I paid attention to ease of setup, ease of use, maintenance needs, how much space each system took up, and how well (or not well) the plants did and why. I noted what was or was not included with each system, and allowed all of the plants to grow to the harvest stage, paying attention to bolting, yields, and general health. I'm a full-time working parent, so I also paid attention to maintenance needs, light schedules, and any general hassles that came up that annoyed me.

How Does WIRED Acquire Gardens to Review?

Most of the gardens WIRED receives to test are samples provided by the companies, with no guarantee of coverage or expectation of what that coverage will look like. Some of the gardens are kept by WIRED in order to perform extended testing, while others are donated locally.

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Kat Merck is a senior commerce editor for WIRED, where she covers smart bird feeders, hair straighteners, toiletry bags, and everything home-related. An editor and writer for more than 25 years, she has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. Following stints as associate ... Read More

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