How often to water jade plant

The interval

A jade plant is watered about every 14 days while it is growing and about every 30 days in winter, and only when the compost is dry all the way through. Growing means the warm, bright months from spring to early autumn, roughly March to September in the northern hemisphere and September to March in the southern. Winter is the cold, short-day part of your own year. The Royal Horticultural Society asks for lightly moist compost in spring and summer and sparing water in winter, and the Missouri Botanical Garden says a jade plant needs no true dormant period but does better with less water from autumn through late winter.

Weight is the best guide. After a thorough soak, lift the pot and note how it feels. A pot that feels light is ready, and one that still feels heavy is not, whatever the calendar says. A finger in the top of the compost is a poor test, because the lower half of the pot holds water long after the surface has dried.

Soak and dry means watering slowly over the compost until it runs freely from the drainage holes, letting it drain, putting the pot back and leaving it alone. The leaves hold the reserve, so the plant does not need a drink every week to be comfortable. Humidity is low for this plant and it needs no misting.

An overwatered jade plant drops leaves that are still plump, and the leaf falls at a touch. Later the base of the stem goes soft, usually over winter. An underwatered one wrinkles its leaves as it uses up its reserve, and a proper soak plumps them within days. If the leaves are wrinkled in wet compost, the roots have failed and more water will not help.

What is particular to jade is how well it is built for drought. SANBI's PlantZAfrica records it in the valley thickets of the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, says it can survive droughts, and calls it sparing with water. It also notes that leaves left at the base can root and become new plants. A dry week does little harm to a plant like that, and a wet fortnight does a great deal.

Related guides

How to tell whether a plant actually needs water

The finger, the weight, the leaf and the pot. Four ways to read a plant's thirst, and what overwatering actually is.

Rescuing an overwatered plant

How to tell overwatering from underwatering, how much root damage is recoverable, and the exact rescue steps once compost has stayed wet too long.

Watering through a southern winter

Winter in the southern hemisphere runs June to August, and houseplants drink far less then. How to read the soil, and why overwatering is the bigger risk.