Lettuce Seeds

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Lettuce Seeds for Planting: Crisp Heads, Loose Leaves, and Salad Mixes

Homegrown lettuce is one of the easiest ways to get a steady stream of fresh salad, and starting from seed opens up shapes, colors, and flavors you'll never see on a supermarket shelf. Our collection of lettuce seeds covers buttery heads, crunchy romaines, frilly loose-leaf types, and ready-made salad blends. Both organic and conventional options are available, and each listing notes which is which, so you can filter by organic status, heirloom type, and container-friendliness.

Lettuce Seed Varieties: Butterhead, Romaine, Loose-Leaf, and Mixes

Butterhead fans can choose from Buttercrunch, Bibb, Little Gem, Tom Thumb, Tennis Ball, and Yugoslavian Red Butterhead, all soft, sweet, and tender. For crisp, tall heads, Jericho, Parris Island Cos, Freckles, Cosmo, and Rouge d'Hiver are dependable romaines, while Iceberg and Hanson Improved offer classic crisphead crunch. If you like to pick leaf by leaf, loose-leaf varieties such as Black Seeded Simpson, Salad Bowl, Red Salad Bowl, Oakleaf, Red Sails, Lollo Rossa, and Deer Tongue keep producing as you harvest. Prefer variety in one packet? Mesclun Mix, Gourmet Lettuce Blend, Salad Bowl Mix, DMR Salad Blend, and Wild Garden Lettuce Mix give you a range of colors and textures. There are also specialty greens like frisée, escarole, and Claytonia (miner's lettuce) for salads with more bite.

Growing Lettuce from Seed: Cool Soil, Steady Sowing

Lettuce is a cool-season crop, and its seed is unusually tolerant of cold: it can germinate at soil temperatures as low as 35°F, while optimal germination happens between 70 and 75°F and hot soil can suppress sprouting. That's why spring and fall are the best planting windows, and it's also why timing is so important. Most listings in this collection show 31 to 60 days to maturity, so lettuce moves fast enough to sow every couple of weeks for continuous harvests. Keeping track of repeat sowings is exactly what the Seedtime garden planning software is built for, with a planting calendar that follows your frost dates and a layout planner that helps you tuck lettuce between slower crops as they grow.

Buy Lettuce Seeds with One Shipping Charge

When you buy lettuce seeds here, you can add seeds from multiple suppliers to the same order and pay one flat shipping charge, or qualify for free standard shipping on Seedtime-fulfilled orders of $49 or more to the lower 48 states. Paid Seedtime members get 20% off seed packets marked "Fulfilled by Seedtime" and 5% off everything else in the store. You can start planning for free, and if you want unlimited calendars and layouts along with those store discounts, compare Seedtime's plans to find the right fit. Whether you want a single lettuce seed packet or a lineup of heads, leaves, and mixes, it all ships together.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does my lettuce turn bitter and shoot up a stalk?

That's bolting, and heat is the main trigger. Several days above 85°F cause lettuce to form a seed stalk, and the leaves turn bitter as it does. Sowing in early spring and again in late summer, giving plants afternoon shade, and choosing slow-bolting varieties all help extend your harvest before it happens.

How do I harvest lettuce so it keeps growing?

With loose-leaf types, pick the outer leaves and leave the center intact, and the plant will keep producing for weeks. For heading types like romaine and butterhead, cut the whole head at the base once it feels firm. Harvest in the morning when leaves are crisp and cool, and rinse and refrigerate soon after for the longest shelf life.

How much space does lettuce need, and can I grow it in containers?

Lettuce is well suited to containers. A single head does well in a 6-inch pot, and in larger containers plants can be spaced on 10-inch centers. Loose-leaf and baby-leaf types can be sown more thickly and cut young, so even a windowsill box or a small raised bed can produce a steady supply of salad.

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