Like all skills in The Sims 4, leveling up unlocks new interactions for your Sims.

• Level 1: This is the base level that lets you buy all Starter Seed Packets and perform basic plant interactions.
  
  
• Level 2: Your Sim can now research gardening on the computer, which will help them gain more skill. The Water area and Evolve interactions are unlocked.
  
  
• Level 3: Your Sim can now fertilize plants, and their fun moodlet increases while gardening.
  
  
• Level 4: The Talk to plants and Harvest area interactions are unlocked. Talking to plants will also boost your Sim’s social moodlet.
  
  
• Level 5: The Take cutting and Graft interactions are unlocked. Your Sim can now buy all Seasonal Seed Packets.
  
  
• Level 6: The Weed area interaction is unlocked.
  
  
• Level 7: The Spray area for bugs interaction is unlocked. Your Sim can now buy three new seed packets: Uncommon Seeds, Farmer Veggies & Herbs, and Farmer Fruits & Flowers.
  
  
• Level 8: Your Sim can now regrow a Bonsai Tree to reshape it, and the Super sell interaction is unlocked. This lets your Sim sell multiple crops at once instead of in separate interactions.
  
  
• Level 9: The Tend garden interaction is unlocked. This makes looking after your garden much faster.
  
  
• Level 10: Your Sim can now buy Rare Seed Packets.

Gardening is one of the many skills included in The Sims 4 Base Game. Your Sim can expand on their gardening skill through Game Packs, Stuff Packs, Expansion Packs, and Kits. To get started with gardening in The Sims, you’ll need somewhere for your Sim to begin planting.

In The Sims 4 Base Game, you’ll need to buy a Garden Pot or Garden Planter Box from Build Mode. If you own the Cottage Living Expansion Pack, you can buy a Garden Patch, and in the Eco Lifestyle Expansion Pack, you can buy a Vertical Garden.

Where do I get seeds?

Now that you have somewhere for your Sim to plant, you’ll need to buy some seeds.

How to buy seeds

• From a Garden Pot, Garden Planter Box, Vertical Garden, or Garden Patch: Select it, then choose Purchase Seeds.
• Using a computer: Select the computer and choose Purchase Seeds.
• Using a phone: Select the phone icon in the bottom left of Live Mode, then choose the Shopping app on your Sim’s phone. Select Purchase Gifts and a pop-up menu will appear. Using the filter at the top left, choose Gardening.

No matter where you buy seeds, you’ll see a pop-up menu that shows the seed types your Sim can buy. Select the seed packets you want and choose how many. Then select the checkmark icon in the bottom right of the pop-up to confirm your purchase.

As your Sim’s gardening skill increases, more seed packets will become available.

Once your Sim has bought seeds

The seed packets will appear in your Sim’s inventory. Before they can begin planting, open the seed packets to see what’s inside.

1. Open your Sim’s inventory, choose the seed packet, and select Open Seed Packet. The fruits, flowers, and vegetables included in the packet will appear in your Sim’s inventory.
2. Select and drag the plants to where you want to plant them.
3. Once you’ve placed the plant, select it and choose Plant.
   

   

   What’s included in each seed packet?

   When you purchase seeds, it won’t say what’s included in each seed packet. Here’s an overview of what you can expect to find.

Caring for and evolving plants

Once you’ve planted the seeds, you’ll need to continue to care for your plants. This includes watering, weeding, and spraying for bugs. As your Sim progresses through the gardening skill, more interactions unlock, like Talk to plant and Fertilizing. Performing these interactions will help to improve the quality of your plant.

When your plant reaches a certain quality, it can evolve. You can see your plant’s current quality by hovering over it.

The evolution levels of a plant are Normal, Nice, Excellent, Magnificent, and Perfect. When your plant reaches the top of a level, it unlocks the Evolve interaction. You’ll know a plant is ready to evolve when the sparkle animation appears around it.

Once you have the basics down, there are a few extra techniques you can use to care for your plants.

• A gardener: Use the phone to hire a gardener who will plant seeds, water, weed, and spray for bugs.

• Burtie’s Bee Box: In the Seasons Expansion Pack, buy Burtie’s Bee Box in Build Mode so bees can pollinate your plants.

• Patchy the Straw Man: In the Seasons Expansion Pack, buy Patchy in Build Mode. Sims can talk to Patchy and build a relationship. Once the relationship level hits Friend, Patchy will help your Sim with gardening tasks.

• Sheep and mini goats: In the Horse Ranch Expansion Pack, your Sim’s sheep and mini goats can help care for plants by eating the weeds and bugs around the crops.

• Golden chickens: In the Cottage Living Expansion Pack having a golden chicken enhances nearby plants to improve their quality.

Find out how to get a golden chicken in our video guide.

How to buy fertilizer

Fertilizing your plants in The Sims 4 is a great way to improve their quality. If you own the Cottage Living Expansion Pack, fertilizer can also help increase the size of your oversized crops. Note that you can’t fertilize plants until you reach Level 3 of the gardening skill.

Here’s how to get fertilizer:

• Buy it: You can buy fertilizer the same way you buy seeds, by clicking on a grow patch or container, and selecting Purchase Fertilizer. You can also buy it at the gardening stall in the main square of Henford-on-Badgley.
  
  
• Using plants in your inventory: Your Sim can also fertilize plants with produce they currently have in their inventory. For example, if they harvested lots of Spinach, you can choose this to fertilize your other plants with.
  
  
• Gather it: 
  • In the Cottage Living Expansion Pack: Your Sim will gather fertilizer when clearing out the barn after a cow or llama.
  • In the Horse Ranch Expansion Pack: Your Sim can gather horse manure to use as fertilizer, or ask the Ranch Hands to collect it for them.

In The Sims 4 Base Game, there's no limit to when you can grow certain plants. If you own the Seasons Expansion Pack, like in real life, you can only grow certain plants in specific seasons.

Take a look at the table below to see which plants grow when, as well as what plants come with specific Game, Stuff, and Expansion Packs.

Planting oversized crops in The Sims 4

Oversized crops, which are included in the Cottage Living Expansion Pack, are a different kind of harvestable than those listed above. They can be grown in all seasons and can differ in size when they're fully grown based on how well they have been cared for.

Oversized crops include:

• Aubergine
• Lettuce
• Mushroom
• Pumpkin
• Watermelon

Can I grow plants out of season?

You can grow plants when they’re out of season if you have the Seasons Expansion Pack installed. Place the plants under any roof, covering, or greenhouse to grow year-round.

Grafting is when your Sim takes a cutting from a plant and grafts it to another plant. Doing this creates a unique plant that you can’t buy seeds for. Your Sim will only be able to start taking cuttings and grafting once they reach level 5 of the gardening skill.

1. To take a cutting, select a plant and choose the Take a cutting interaction.
2. The cutting will then appear in your Sim’s inventory. Hover over a cutting to see which type of plant it was taken from.
3. To graft this cutting onto another plant, select a plant and choose the Graft interaction. This will bring up the options of which cutting to graft from your Sim’s inventory.

For an overview of what new plants you can create with this method, check out the list below. Some of these are common and easy to create, but others are rarer and more difficult to grow!

• Plantain: Graft Pear to Lemon.
  
  
• Parsley: Graft Sage to Basil.
  
  
• Grape: Graft Bluebell to Strawberry.
  
  
• Bird of Paradise: Graft Tulip to Chrysanthemum.
  
  
• Bonsai Bud: Graft Rose to Grape, or graft Daisy to Strawberry.
  
  
• Pomegranate: Graft Cherry to Apple.
  
  
• Dragonfruit: Graft Snapdragon to Strawberry.
  
  
• Cow Berry: Graft Dragonfruit to Snapdragon.
  
  
• Orchid: Graft Lily to Snapdragon.
  
  
• Death Flower: Graft Pomegranate to Orchid.

Looking to create the infamous Cowplant? Be warned! This plant has been known to eat unsuspecting Sims, so create at your own peril.

To grow a Cowplant, you’ll need a Cow Berry. These aren't available to buy as a plant or seed in the game. One way to get one is through grafting. You can also find Cow Berries in various places throughout the world:

• when exploring space in the rocket ship
• fishing in the ponds in Oasis Springs
• fishing in the Forgotten Grotto Lake (this is the secret lot in Oasis Springs)
• when digging for treasure.

Learn how to get Magic Beans and make your Sim into a PlantSim:

1. Have your Sim reach level 10 of the gardening skill. With level 10 unlocked, you can buy rare seed packets using the computer, or in Build Mode.
2. Each rare seed packet contains one Magic Bean. To plant this, buy the Magic PlantSim Stump in Build Mode.
3. When you have six Magic Beans, your Sim can plant them in the Magic PlantSim Stump.
4. After watering, the Mystical Magic Bean Portal Tree will grow from the Stump and your Sim can travel through the portal.
5. When your Sim returns with the Forbidden Fruit of the PlantSim (they don’t always return with this, it may take multiple tries), they can eat it and turn into a PlantSim.

PlantSims are no ordinary Sims, and will return to normal after five days. If you want them to remain a PlantSim, have your Sim plant the Forbidden Fruit of the PlantSim so they can grow and continue eating it.

PlantSims also have different needs than the average Sim:

• Their hunger moodlet will no longer be filled by eating regular food. Instead, it fills up when they're in the sun or by choosing the Absorbing solar energy interaction on plants.
  
• Their bladder moodlet gets replaced with a water moodlet, which they can fill by showering, bathing, or drinking water.