Hydroponic gardening is more than just a trend. Believe it or not, it’s perfectly possible to grow plants indoors without needing soil, and for many people, doing without any kind of muddy mess is a major boon. What’s more, some studies show that hydroponic gardening may prove to be healthier for our greens than traditional growing methods! But which hydroponic gardening methods work best in practice – and which system should you invest in between Lettuce Grow vs Gardyn?
In this guide, I’ll take you through what you need to know about both the Gardyn Home Kit and Lettuce Grow’s farmstand – and which options may appeal to you the most as a discerning houseplant aficionado!
Lettuce Grow vs Gardyn: Quick Summary
If you don’t have time to get through this guide right now, don’t worry – here are the key points you’ll need to know before going ahead and buying.
- Gardyn has a subscription model, while costs for Lettuce Grow each month can vary. You can grow up to 30 plants a month on a $29 plan under Gardyn, which also gives you access to the service’s brilliant AI gardener app. Lettuce Grow also offers a subscription from $55/month for 12 plants indoors or $34/month for 12 plants outdoors.
- Gardyn supports plants with a system that’s around 5 feet, 4 inches tall. Lettuce Grow has a range of size options depending on your needs.
- You’ll typically pay more for Gardyn outright, as Lettuce Grow offers a sliding scale of purchase options depending on size and complexity.
- You can grow up to 30 plants with Gardyn, and up to 36 with Lettuce Grow.
- You don’t have to use Lettuce Grow’s plants to use its system, but it’s beneficial if you do. You’ll need to use Gardyn’s plants to get the best results out of the system.
Why should I try hydroponic gardening?
The short answer is, of course, why not? This style of gardening may sound a little odd to many houseplant enthusiasts, but with a little work, it’s easy enough to make sure your greens get the nutrients they need from water rather than from soil. Both Gardyn and Lettuce Grow offer specialist tanks that you can fit together to grow plants within your home.
Hydroponic systems are thought to help speed up healthy growth by up to three times – but your own experience may vary! Hydroponics are also amazingly popular with people who may not have much in the way of traditional space to be able to grow healthy plants of their own. What’s more, not everyone wants to have to clean up soil every five minutes!
Let’s take a detailed look at the two major hydroponic services available to try in the US right now – Lettuce Grow and Gardyn – and why either might be your best shot at growing healthy crops without soil.
What is Lettuce Grow, and how does it work?
Amazing puns aside, Lettuce Grow is an urban gardening solution that’s famous for its multi-sized farmstand, a hydroponic setup that lets you autonomously water and grow plants in relatively restricted spaces.
This system works by delivering enriched water to your plants – you’re essentially providing fertilized H2O a few drinks at a time. You’re even able to set up grow lights with the standard Lettuce Grow farmstand, meaning if you have dark spaces in your home and a particularly sun-thirsty plant, you’re already fixed.
The farmstand operates through a water pump that’s fairly hands-free. You only need to maintain or check the system a couple of times a week.
Lettuce Grow is an innovative brand that’s inspired by urban vegetable production and some of the growth solutions developed by NASA over the years. In fact, if you’ve seen ‘The Martian’ starring Matt Damon, you may already have an idea of what I’m talking about!
Essentially, Lettuce Grow allows you to set up your own tiny vegetable garden or plant setup in corners of your property that would otherwise struggle to host them.
What is Gardyn, and how does it work?
Gardyn’s two square feet of hydroponic gardening will be just as appealing as Lettuce Grow to indoor gardeners who don’t necessarily have much space to set up extensive crops. The Gardyn Home Kit is a leading proponent of their hydroponics range, offering water pump technology that, similar to Lettuce Grow, actively delivers nutrients to your plants.
Gardyn tends to follow a more tech-savvy approach to hydroponics than Lettuce Grow, though both have clear benefits and intuitive approaches to indoor gardening. For example, Gardyn provides an app with a built-in assistant that helps you get started step by step. The latest lines of Gardyn hydroponics actively measure the water your plants need from hour to hour, and are even fitted with technology that works out when your greens are under or overwatered.
Gardyn is likely to appeal to gardeners who are inspired by the AI revolution – as you’re effectively handing over gardening duties to a robot! If this sounds exciting, just wait – as you’ll be able to take note of when it’s time to top up and even harvest your veg thanks to built-in sensors and app alerts.
Gardyn has a further edge over Lettuce Grow in that it has grow lights built into its system. With Lettuce Grow, you’ll need to invest in separate rings, which can cost hundreds of dollars outright.
How large are the systems?
One of the major selling points of Lettuce Grow is the fact that it doesn’t have a single size setup. Depending on what you’d like to grow, you can choose a small unit that allows for up to 12 plants, or a large 36 plant unit that’s great for a clutch of vegetable, herbs and greens. If you want to get technical, Lettuce Grow runs the gamut between 3 feet 8 inches and 6 feet 1 inch tall.
While Gardyn offers a raft of technological wonders, it falls down a little when it comes to size versatility. Unlike Lettuce Grow, Gardyn systems are available in a standard five feet four inches. That’s more than enough to take care of veggies in tighter spaces, but some may prefer the choice available with LG.
You can grow up to maximum of 30 different plants with a Gardyn system, and up to 36 with the largest Lettuce Grow setup. Not much difference? Keep reading…
Do I need to buy plants with my hydroponic system?
Your combinations may vary, but you’ll also be able to choose from more than 200 different types of plant within the Lettuce Grow range that are compatible with the system. Gardyn also recommends that you choose plants they sell directly to best fit your system(s).
That said, Lettuce Grow appears to be a little more adaptive if you want to install other hydroponic friendly plants from elsewhere. Gardyn, meanwhile, advises sticking to their supplies. In either case, I’d recommend you buy directly from the brands (just to be sure).
Pricing
Of course, all of this wonderful indoor growing greatness arrives at a cost. You’ll need to pay an upfront cost for the technology and any plants, as well as for a subscription service (if you choose Gardyn).
Gardyn’s subscription model is available from $29/month, which covers 30 plants and access to the AI service. The benefit to Lettuce Grow here is that you don’t have to pay a subscription to use the service, but you’ll likely end up paying roughly the same costs each month in terms of plants and fertilizer.
Upfront costs, however, is where things get a little more interesting. The Gardyn Home Kit 2.0 is $695 (or $595 with current promo), while Gardyn 3.0 is available for $899 (or $799 with current promo).
Lettuce Grow lets you start growing from as little as $399, with the largest model costing $699 at standard rate. As mentioned earlier, glow rings are where costs really start to stack up. You’ll need to pay at least $200 for rings to clip to your hydroponics – meaning fees are starting to creep up to Gardyn’s price point.
Crucially, you’ll need to consider which system offers you the best value. Gardyn’s systems are clearly priced for the convenience of the AI functionality, for example.
Ease of maintenance
Both Gardyn and Lettuce Grow are relatively easy to maintain, but Gardyn will require a little more work than the latter.
You’ll need to clean out your Gardyn system no more than once per month on average, but a thorough clean is always recommended twice a year. You’ll need to rinse out the whole system with water and dish soap – and may even need hydrogen peroxide for the main reservoir.
Lettuce Grow’s farmstand will only really need you to add water, fertilizer and check pH levels every week. This only takes a few minutes. It’s normally a good idea to ‘reset’ your farmstand every season, too.
Are hydroponics systems eco-friendly?
Generally, yes – hydroponics systems are very eco-friendly, and both Gardyn and Lettuce Grow are built from recycled products.
Hydroponics are great for reducing CO2 in various ways. For example, by growing your own vegetables in your home, you’re reducing the need for transportation of goods to stores. Neither Gardyn nor Lettuce Grow produce CO2 as-is, either – and you won’t need a lot of power to keep them running.
Can I use Lettuce Grow and Gardyn outside?
There’s certainly nothing stopping you using hydroponics outside, but Gardyn is built with indoor gardening in mind, while Lettuce Grow is ideal for outdoor maintenance.
In fact, using Lettuce Grow outside makes a lot of sense. That’s because the system’s lack of grow lights means you don’t have to invest in additional technology to make the most of the hydroponics. You can simply set up your farmstand in a corner of your garden and provide your plants with sunlight.
You may prefer to set up a separate grow light option to the glow rings that you’d usually connect to Lettuce Grow. Keep in mind, too, that you’ll likely need a separate stand to host them on, allowing you to rotate them across the day whenever your plants need lights the most.
You can use either Lettuce Grow or Gardyn indoors – but I’d recommend Gardyn purely because of the built-in grow light LEDs.
What’s better in Gardyn vs Lettuce Grow?
Now we’ve sifted through the various attributes of each system, let’s quickly run through the pros and cons of Gardyn and Lettuce Grow.
Gardyn pros and cons
Gardyn is the best choice out of the two if you’re new to gardening and wouldn’t mind a helping hand getting started with hydroponics. Its app and AI service will help you make the most of your water, and will show you how you can grow plants faster and stronger through this style of system.
Gardyn is also built for indoor use, and arrives with grow lights built-in. Out of the two, Gardyn is clearly the top choice for gardeners who are invested in tech.
However, Gardyn is the more costly choice of the two. It costs more upfront and carries a subscription fee. It’s also restricted to one height, and carries fewer plants (only just) compared to Lettuce Grow’s largest farmstand.
Lettuce Grow pros and cons
Lettuce Grow is arguably pivoted towards those gardeners with a little more experience, as there’s not much hand-holding. Despite the lack of an app (and grow lights at first), their farmstand range is still intuitive, and provides fantastic results at a fraction of what you’ll pay through Gardyn.
Lettuce Grow is also much more versatile than Gardyn with regard to size and scope. If you only want to grow a few plants compared to a full 30, you don’t have to pay for the full farmstand. This makes it cheaper – there’s no subscription fee, though you will have to pay extra for those grow lights. The Lettuce Grow price you pay will depend entirely on what you want to get out of it.
Lettuce Grow isn’t the most intuitive for indoor gardening, though it will work wonders in a small corner of your garden.
Conclusion
Both Gardyn and Lettuce Grow offer fantastic introductions to hydroponics, but both are quite different from each other. It’s easy to set up with either option, but I’d recommend Gardyn for serious beginners – as well as those who lean towards technology.
Can you get the same results from Gardyn and Lettuce Grow? That all depends on what you want to grow, and the time you’d like to put in. Consider the overall costs, and what you’d like to achieve from soil-free gardening – I’d recommend either option!
