How often to water snake plant

The interval

A snake plant is watered about every 14 days in the growing season and about every 28 days in winter, and only when the compost has dried right through. The growing season is spring to early autumn in your own hemisphere, so the plant on a southern windowsill and the one on a northern windowsill are on opposite halves of the calendar. In a cool room in winter the compost can stay wet for far longer than 28 days, and the NC State plant toolbox says to water only every one to two months then. The Royal Horticultural Society's advice is to protect it from winter wet.

A finger only reports on the top few centimetres, and this plant is judged by the whole pot, so push a finger in as deep as it will go and lift the pot. After a soak the pot is heavy. A few days later it feels lighter, and a plant that needs water is obviously light. If the compost is dry at the bottom and the pot feels light, water. If you are unsure, wait another week, because the thick leaves carry the plant through.

An overwatered snake plant goes soft at the base. The leaf bases turn mushy, the fan lifts away from the compost, and by the time you see it the rhizome underneath is usually gone. The Missouri Botanical Garden lists overwatering as the main risk. A thirsty one is gentler about it. The leaves lose their stiffness, wrinkle or curl inwards as the plant draws on its stored water, and they plump up again after a proper soak.

Soak and dry means exactly that. Pour slowly over the compost until water runs from the drainage holes, let it drain completely and put the pot back. A small drink every few days wets the top and leaves the roots below it dry.

The thing particular to this plant is the crown. Water that sits in the centre of the fan between the leaves rots the growing point, and the Missouri Botanical Garden says to keep water off the centre of the rosette. Water the compost, not the plant.

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.