Stardew Valley: The Best Crops for Each Season

Stardew Valley is all about a peaceful and relaxed life. However, establishing your farm as a thriving business means you’ll want to know the best crops for each season. This will help you maximize your revenue and secure your financial growth.

Growing Crops in Stardew Valley

It’s really up to you how you want to spend your time in Stardew Valley. That’s a huge part of its charm. The game itself allows you plenty of freedom to use your farm as you see fit. However, to fully realize your new home’s potential, you’ll want to have an understanding of growing and harvesting crops. That said, the farming process, while worthwhile, can be a bit overwhelming to begin with.

Knowing which crops will yield the biggest returns in terms of profits is crucial. There are a wide variety of crops to work with in Stardew Valley, so you’ll want to understand how to farm them efficiently and for maximum financial gain.

Wherever possible, you’ll want to ensure you plant plenty of multi-season crops, as they’ll continue to grow throughout most seasons without needing to be replanted. This will save you money overall as you won’t need to keep buying seeds each time. Be sure to plant these recurring crops as early as you can into the season to maximize profitability.

Each season brings different opportunities for crop harvesting and profit returns. However, some crops are definitely more valuable than others in terms of what you’ll earn from them. Additionally, some seasons are more lucrative than others, so it’s helpful to know which ones to spend more time farming in.

The Best Spring Crops

You’ll start your adventures in Stardew Valley in the spring, with some Parsnip seeds and 500g. However, getting things right in the spring can make a huge overall difference to the year’s profitability. Plant these crops to boost your income in the spring and you’ll be able to buy more expensive seeds and items in the following seasons.

Strawberry

• Growth Time: 8 Days
• Recurring Harvests: every 4 days
• Seed Price: 100g
• Sale Value: 120-240g
• Where to buy: sold by Pierre during the Egg Festival

The best spring crop is the Strawberry, however, you can’t buy Strawberry seeds until the Egg Festival. This takes place on Spring 13 and is the only time you can get these valuable seeds.

Although it’s tempting to plant them right away, it will be more profitable in the long term to save them until the next spring season. That way, you can plant them on day one and they’ll provide you with five harvests before the summer season starts. Or, if you manage to repair the Greenhouse before the next spring season, it’s also worth waiting to plant your strawberries in it.

Taking care of your Strawberry crops will pay off handsomely, so plan ahead and save up some gold so you can buy as many of them as possible.

Other Profitable Spring Crops to Plant

The Best Summer Crops

Summer is a more profitable season to grow crops in than spring. You can make a lot of gold during this season if you plan, plant, and harvest accordingly.

Blueberry

• Growth Time: 13 days
• Recurring Harvests: every 4 days
• Seed Price: 80g
• Sale Value: 50-100g
• Where to buy: Pierre’s Store (for the lowest price)

Blueberry is the most fruitful crop to plant in the summertime, as it produces multiples at each harvest. Each harvest provides three blueberries, with a 2% chance for additional Blueberry fruits to drop with each collection.

They’ll take 13 days to grow, but are a recurring crop. This means that every four days after the first harvest, they’ll have grown back without you needing to plant more. They’re also very reasonably priced at 80g per seed pack.

Starfruit

• Growth Time: 13 days
• Recurring Harvests: N/A
• Seed Price: 400g
• Sale Value: 750-1500g
• Where to buy: Oasis Traveling Cart (for the lowest price)

Starfruit is also one of the best summer crops to plant. However, if you’re just starting out you may want to begin with Blueberries in year one. This is because Starfruit can be quite expensive to get started with. Also, you’ll need to have completed the Vault Bundle in the Community Center to access the Oasis Traveling Cart, which is the only place you can buy the seeds.

Starfruit seeds cost 400g and take 13 days to grow. They’re incredibly profitable though and can be sold for between 750 and 1,500g apiece, depending on quality.

Other Profitable Summer Crops to Plant

The Best Fall Crops

The fall season is the most lucrative season of all to grow crops in. It’s also an important month for planting plenty of crops to earn money through the following winter. As with summer, investing in berries is a wise move throughout fall, as they’ll yield multiple harvests and provide excellent profits.

Sweet Gem Berry

• Growth Time: 24 days
• Recurring Harvests: N/A
• Seed Price: between 600-1,000g (season dependent)
• Sale Value: 3,000-6,000g
• Where to buy: Traveling Cart in Cindersnap Forest

Sweet Gem Berry is one of the most profitable crops in the game. However, it grows from a Rare Seed that can only be purchased from the Traveling Cart in Cindersnap Forest. The price of these Rare Seeds depends on the season you buy them in. Overall though, they’re a fairly expensive investment, especially if you’re only just starting out. Regardless, Sweet Gem Berries can be sold for at least triple their value, making them an immensely profitable crop to add to your farm.

Cranberry

• Growth Time: 7 days
• Recurring Harvests: every 5 days
• Seed Price: 240g
• Sale Value: 75-150g
• Where to buy: Pierre’s Store

Cranberry crops provide the best overall ongoing value and profitability, as each harvest yields multiple berries per plant. They also continue to grow after each harvest, meaning that they’ll provide a steady stream of income if planted early enough in the season.

Cranberry plants will also grow in the greenhouse throughout the winter, so you can maintain an ongoing turnover of gold during the cold season. Top-quality cranberry crops can pull in 150g each, so there’s a lot of gold to be made from their fairly short growth cycle.

Other Profitable Fall Crops to Plant

The Best Crops to Grow in the Greenhouse

During the winter, you’ll have to use your greenhouse to plant and harvest crops. Nothing will grow outside during this season, so be sure to get your greenhouse repaired as soon as you can. Crop growth can be challenging during the winter, so you’ll need to plan ahead and plant some perennial seeds during the summer and fall seasons.

Ancient Fruit

• Growth Time: 28 days
• Seed Price: 100-1,000g (when bought in spring, summer, or fall)
• Recurring Harvests: every 7 days
• Sale Value: 550-1,100g
• Where to buy: Traveling Cart in Cindersnap Forest or by donating an Ancient Seed Artifact at the Museum

Ancient Fruit will grow in the greenhouse all year round and will regrow every seven days. You’ll need to plant Ancient Seeds on the first day of a season in order to harvest Ancient Fruit on day one of the next season. However, investing in these crops will ensure you have an ongoing stream of gold all year round, especially when planted in the greenhouse. This will save you from financial struggles during the winter as the years go by in Stardew Valley.

Sweet Gem Berry plants will also provide excellent profits when grown in the greenhouse. Likewise, so will Starfruit, although remember that these both are single-harvest crops. Planting Strawberry, Blueberry and Cranberry crops in the greenhouse will ensure constant berry production and also ensure a steady stream of gold throughout the winter.

Other Profitable Greenhouse Crops to Plant

Multi-Season Crops to Invest In

• Ancient Fruit and Sweet Gem Berry – Expensive, but worth it long-term
• Fruit Trees – When planted in the greenhouse, these will bear fruit all year round
• Coffee Bean – (Spring and summer, grows in the greenhouse) produces four beans every two days
• Corn – (Summer and fall, grows in the greenhouse) ready after 14 days, regrows every four days
• Wheat – (Plant in summer and fall, grows in the greenhouse) ready after four days

These crops will grow during multiple seasons and provide multiple harvests. This will improve the overall efficiency of your farming and save money on seed purchasing.

Coffee Bean plants in particular are worth the investment for their large recurring harvests. When grown in the greenhouse, they’ll pretty much flourish forever. Coffee Bean seeds are also often dropped by Dust Sprites in the mines, so there’s a chance you’ll be able to get a hold of some for free.

Using Fertilizers on Your Crops

Fertilizers are an excellent way to improve your crop farming in Stardew Valley. They can be used in all seasons, although they’ll need to be used in the greenhouse during the winter. Using fertilizers can have a number of positive effects on your crops. Some fertilizers will speed up the growth of your crops, whereas others will improve their quality or ability to retain water.

You can use fertilizers at different points in the farming process, depending on the type of product they are. Some need to be mixed into tilled soil before you plant your crops, but others can be added to plants at any point as they’re growing.

Types of Fertilizers

Fertilizer comes in three standard tiers: Basic, Quality, and Deluxe. You can access the different tiers after leveling up your Farming and Foraging skills. For speed, you can buy Basic Fertilizer and Quality Fertilizer at Pierre’s Store.

However, once you’ve learned the recipes, you can also craft them yourself. Crafting fertilizers is the best way to save gold as opposed to buying them from the store. The Deluxe Fertilizer recipe can only be bought on Ginger Island, which you’ll be able to visit later in the game.

These are the three varieties of fertilizers.

• Fertilizer (Basic, Quality, Deluxe) – These improve soil quality and boost the chance of growing quality crops
• Retaining Soil (Basic, Quality, Deluxe) – These improve crops’ ability to stay watered overnight
• Speed-Gro (Speed-Gro, Deluxe, Hyper) – These increase crop growth rates by at least 10%, 25% and 33%, respectively.

Your fertilizers will stay in the soil you add them to for the whole season, so if you’re going to use them, add them to your crops early for maximum longevity.

Tips For Growing Crops in Stardew Valley

You’ll want to prioritize the rebuilding of your farm’s greenhouse as soon as possible. Crops won’t grow during the winter in Stardew Valley. You’ll need to get your greenhouse back up and running to continue growing your crops inside it during the colder months.

Try to plan ahead when growing crops by considering growth times and crop longevity. Seasons are 28 days long and each crop has its own set growth time. Any crops that haven’t been harvested at the end of a season will wither and die. So plan ahead where possible and plant seeds during the early days of a season.

Certain crops have to be grown on a trellis, so you’ll want to factor that in when you’re planning the layout of your crops. Setting up individual fenced farming plots for different crops is a good idea to help you keep on top of what’s growing where.

You can automate your crop harvesting by building Junimo Huts on your farm. However, this can only be done after the completion of a number of quests, so it’s something to bear in mind for when you’re further along the main storyline.

Watering and Artisan Crafting

Crops must be watered every day to achieve maximum growth. Don’t forget about this, or your crop’s growth cycle could become longer, as they won’t grow if they’re left unwatered. Or worse, your crops could completely wither away.

If you’ve increased your farming skill to level two and have the materials, you can craft basic sprinklers. Place these around your farm to help automate crop watering. Sprinklers will water their four closest tilled tiles every morning, which can help save you the time and energy you’d spend doing it manually. Better quality crafted sprinklers can water a larger of tiles, so keep that in mind as you level up your farming skills. They can also sometimes be gifted from NPCs, so continue to work on those relationships too!

Using your fruit and vegetables to create Artisan goods can also boost their sale prices massively. After leveling up your Farming skill enough, you can use Artisan equipment such as kegs and preserves jars to make wines, ales, pickles, and jellies from your produce. This will lead to even bigger profits from your raw fruit and vegetable yields.