As much as I’ve always wanted to be a plant mom, my history with growing greens is grim at best. I’ve tried all kinds of gardening, from lettuce in an outdoor patch to cultivating “easy” houseplants like succulents and cacti. No matter my numerous attempts with rescued grocery store greens and plant clubs, I’m always left with a dead plant, an empty pot and a “black thumb.”

That’s why my interest was piqued when I heard about Gardyn. Gardyn offers indoor systems that take care of everything in two square feet of space (or less). The best part? You can grow herbs, greens, veggies, flowers with no plant-sitting or experience required! A simple, self-watering solution for an at-home garden that touts itself as “goof-proof” sounds almost too good to be true. As a city slicker, I absolutely had to try it out—if I can cultivate garden-fresh herbs and veggies indoors, year-round, anyone can!

What is Gardyn?

Gardyn is known for its indoor hydroponic garden systems, which use smart technology to grow organic plants in small spaces. Even apartment dwellers can start their own garden inside without the mess! You don’t need dirt or an outdoor garden bed to grow with Gardyn—just a smart phone and some patience.

The brand offers over 100 tasty plant varieties suitable for its garden systems, from tomatoes and strawberries to lavender and basil. You can even grow microgreens. Each month, Gardyn rolls out new plants and species.

Each Gardyn hydroponic system grow plants vertically without soil, yielding the most produce in the smallest footprint. Gardyn devices come in two sizes: a 16-plant system that takes up less than 1-1/2 square feet of space and a 30-plant system that takes up 2 square feet. Each system is outfitted with LED lights and cameras that monitor your crops 24/7, so you don’t have to. Plus, the systems are self-watering, so you don’t have to remember to water plants—my biggest failure when it comes to botanicals.

How We Tested the Gardyn Studio

I opted for the Gardyn Studio, a 4-1/2-foot-tall indoor growing system. It takes up less than 1-1/2 square feet of space, so I was able to pop it into the corner of my dining room. The Studio comes with a 16-plant starter set, plant food and a 30-day free trial of the Gardyn membership. Don’t sweat about another subscription, though. You’ll have access and control of your Gardyn device through the app, with or without a membership.

I began my Gardyn review journey on July 14. Here’s an account of my first 45 days with my Gardyn, along with everything I learned during my first foray into hydroponic gardening.

Ordering

When you select your hydroponic system, the website lets you pick your starter pod pack (also called “yCubes”) from three options. For the Studio, choose from Salad Lover, Budding Florist and Chef Faves bundles, all of which include 16 plants to start out. For my purposes, I chose the Salad Lover starter set, which contains greens and herbs. It has a huge variety, including options like breen, kohlrabi, red mustard, spinach, basil, bunching onions and even a sunflower that you can harvest seeds from!

Setup

The Gardyn ships in a huge branded box. Upon unpacking everything, I was greeted to tubes, tubs and poles galore. I was initially a little overwhelmed. However, the instructions are detailed and walked me step-by-step through the process of setting up my Gardyn. First, I set aside the small box of yCubes and the included plant food. Then, I got to work building my Gardyn, which was easier than I expected.

Each Studio unit comes with two poles with staggered holes where the yCubes sit, a vertical light with a camera, a watering tub, power cord, pump and a cover for the fill hole. You also receive hardware that helps mount the unit to the wall, in case you have curious kids or pets. Overall, setup took me less than 15 minutes. Assembling the unit is a simple matter of connecting tubes, securing the light, lowering in the pump and connecting the power cord.

I then connected the unit to my wifi per the instructions and gave my Gardyn a name (I chose Karen). This part took the most time, as it requires a quick internet check, downloading the Gardyn app and connecting my unit to the app. From there, I followed the instructions for setup by filling my unit with three gallons of water and placing my yCubes. The app asks which starter pack you purchased, then recommends where each yCube should go based on its needs—super helpful! Prepping the yCubes is easy: Just plop them into the designated holes on the two poles.

App

The app is probably the most important part of the system. It’s where all the magic happens! For both subscribers and casual growers it serves as home to a wealth of information, such as an image feed of the unit, plant insights, comprehensive encyclopedias for each plant and a journal. You can also use it to access the shop and contact customer service.

The Gardyn Shop is home to everything folks need to furnish their garden. This includes accessories like a garden dolly, trellis, sprout nurseries, plant food, and pod caps. You can also find microgreen kits and additional yCubes listed here.

As you grow, the Gardyn unit automatically waters plants and operates the lighting schedule based on your selected options, leaving you with minimal maintenance tasks. That said, Gardyn Members enjoy additional benefits, such as an outline of any outstanding tasks and a Thryve Journey score. Plus, you get the bonus expertise of Kelby, Gardyn’s AI assistant. Each customer who purchases a Gardyn system receives a free 30-day trial of Kelby.

Membership

There are lots of benefits to being a Gardyn Member, with Kelby being the big one. Kelby is an incredibly useful tool, especially for those just starting out. It sends alerts when it’s time to perform maintenance tasks, answers specific questions and helps troubleshoot any issues. It even offers a “vacation mode,” which automatically reduces light and watering schedules to slow plant growth until your return.

As part of a monthly subscription, Gardyn Members enjoy free shipping once per month, access to member-only yCubes, exclusive discounts on products (like 60% off additional yCubes) and five to 10 monthly plant credits. Redeem the credits for either yCubes or Gardyn’s basic plant food. You can also bank up to 30 credits at one time.

After using Kelby for a month, I ended up loving it and purchased the year-long subscription for $468. You can also snag a two-year membership for $936 or choose to pay month-to-month instead, which costs around $39 per month. While pricey, the cost feels fair for all the extras. In addition, Gardyn allows folks to finance their payments with Affirm.

It’s worth noting that you can absolutely have a beautiful, thriving Gardyn without ever purchasing a membership. Without a subscription, users can still utilize the app to customize lighting and watering routines, check on humidity and temperature levels, look up information on each plant and order yCubes. However, I recommend splurging on the subscription for at least the first few months if you’re new to hydroponic gardening or—like me—typically have bad luck growing things.

Maintenence

While lighting and watering are already taken care of, there’s still a few miscellaneous maintenance tasks to perform every so often. The biggest ones are tank refreshes, water top-ups and root checks.

Tank refreshes happen once a month and entail a full tank clean out to remove any bacteria for healthy plants. Water top ups take just a few minutes and typically require a couple of gallons of water and a couple teaspoons of plant food. These occur when the water levels get below a certain threshold. Root checks happen every few weeks and entail a quick snip to remove rotting roots.

Members enjoy periodic reminders for all these tasks. Non-members need to track these tasks on their own.

Sprout Trim

The first “harvest” Gardyn gives you is a batch of microgreen-like sprouts, which you cultivate when your plants start to sprout second and third stems. A few weeks into the process, I was beginning to see some seriously strong sprouts. Around this time, the app urged me to cut my plants down to only one per pod, barring any herbs like cilantro, which allow up to three plants per pod.

Admittedly, this felt a lot like taking a step back, and I was sad to see my beautiful greens get significantly smaller. However, this is a necessary step to ensure the plants get all the nutrients and water they need to grow strong and healthy.

In total, I harvested about a cup of microgreens. Kelby let me know that they are all safe to eat, so I incorporated them into a single-serving salad. Tasting my very first homegrown greens, even just a handful of them, was such a surreal experience for me. They were absolutely bursting with flavor and made my salad look and taste like something from a fancy restaurant!

First Harvest

After just over a month, my plants were nearly six inches tall and overtaking my Gardyn completely. Our first real harvest was bountiful, yielding a huge salad’s worth of greens. I have to say that eating freshly grown greens that you cultivated is such a special experience. Not only do I know that they’re pesticide-free, but there’s virtually zero processing from harvest to table. The greens my Gardyn produces are the most flavorful, beautiful veggies and herbs I’ve ever enjoyed!

I opt to trim my plants down to about a third of their size each time I harvest to ensure they continue to produce delicious greens in perpetuity (or as long as they’ll last). However, it’s also totally possible to harvest all the greens at once for a huge one-time harvest. Every two to three days there’s enough regrowth for another salad for two—it really pays for itself over time. Since my first big harvest, my husband and I haven’t had to run to the grocery store for greens, because we already have more than we could ever want!

I’ve already ordered my first round of additional yCubes with my allotted monthly credits. I’m excited to eventually add fairytale eggplant and poblano peppers (among a few other flavorful options) to the rotation. The yCubes are fine sitting of the shelf for a few months, so I plan on switching over when one of my plants eventually passes.

Sprout Guarantee

Unfortunately, three of my plants—bunching onions, bull’s blood and kale—had trouble growing. I’m not sure what happened, but they stopped thriving shortly after sprouting, with my bunching onions eventually dying completely. While it’s a bit of a bummer, I still ended up with 13 healthy plants and more than enough greens for a few salads each week.

Gardyn stands by their products, so it’s worth reaching out to them to troubleshoot, especially if your plants don’t sprout at all. The brand offers a sprout guarantee, so they’ll replace any yCubes that fail to sprout after the first month.

Other Gardyn Products

The Gardyn Home system is similar to the Gardyn Studio, but it’s about half a foot taller and wider and can hold 30 plants. Like the Studio, this device monitors your plants 24/7 with a camera. The Gardyn Home also comes with a 30-plant starter set, plant food and a free trial of the Gardyn membership. Both the Studio and Home come with two-year warranties.

The Gardyn microgreens growing kit has everything you need to harvest microgreens, including a food-grade plastic white hydroponic nursery that accommodates 10 plants. Enjoy fresh arugula, lemon basil, green shiso and more. The nursery is 5×12 inches and comes with a humidity dome and 10 grow plates. With this kit, you’ll have ready-to-eat fresh microgreens in as little as one week.

Product Tester Sheri Kaz tried the microgreens kit and was impressed with the convenience and speedy growth!

Gardyn vs. AeroGarden

We’ve also tested Aerogarden in the past, which is a similar hydroponic garden option. Much like Gardyn, AeroGarden automatically takes care of watering the plants and controlling lights via an app. There are several different units to choose from on the AeroGarden website, from tiny tabletop options to larger, freestanding units.

While AeroGarden offers a similar setup, the biggest difference is in its yield. Unlike the Gardyn units which hold 16-30 plants, the largest AeroGarden unit only offers space for 12 plants. You also don’t get the benefits you’d get with a Gardyn Membership, such as Kelby, credits and discounts.

Final Verdict

Not only is my Gardyn Studio easy to use and pretty much self-sustaining, it’s also teaching me a lot about growing my own plants. In fact, I’ve built up enough confidence over the past month to try my hand at outdoor gardening again! Luckily, I don’t need to worry about edible greens—I already have more than enough thanks to my Gardyn.

Overall, the Gardyn Studio is such a nifty system. I primarily recommend it to anyone with little to no yard space and those with a “black thumb,” but the truth is that anyone can benefit from owning a Gardyn. It’s such a fun and fulfilling way to become a little more self-sufficient. It also sparked a fun new hobby for my family; my husband and I check on it several times a day and excitedly discuss any changes we see.

Where to Buy

You can shop all our favorite Gardyn items directly from the brand’s site. The Gardyn Studio retails for $500, and the Gardyn Home retails for $900. The microgreens complete kit is $100. Plants and accessories are also available at varying prices, with plants starting at $1.99 for members and $4.99 for non-members.

While pricey, we love Gardyn’s options for growing produce at home, regardless of space constraints, lighting and climate. Your own indoor garden is just a click away!

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FAQ

Is Gardyn worth it?

For folks who have a “black thumb” or limited yard space, Gardyn is a great investment. It makes growing both edible and non-edible botanicals easy, fun and stress-free.

How does Gardyn work?

Gardyn is a hydroponic garden, so it works by using water alone to grow greens and flowers. The lighting and watering schedule is fully automated with the Gardyn app, so it’s incredibly easy to maintain a bountiful garden with little to no plant experience.

How much are Gardyn pods?

Gardyn pods (called “yCubes”) start at $1.99 for Gardyn members or $4.99 for non-members. Members can also redeem their free credits for additional yCubes each month.

Why You Should Trust Us

The Taste of Home team dedicates itself to vetting and testing the products we recommend. Our expertise ranges from big purchases like the best food processors to smaller splurges like buying seeds online. Our Product Testing Team has more than 25 combined years of experience in professional product selection and testing.

As resident food and drink expert at Taste of Home, I love to enjoy fresh greens with nearly every meal. Admittedly I also have very little experience with gardening, making me the perfect test subject for this Gardyn review.

For this piece, we also spoke to Lauren Judge, who is on the American Community Gardening Association (ACGA) board.