Tomato · São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
When to plant tomatoes in São Paulo
Main outdoor window
not outdoors here
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
no spring frost
In São Paulo, on your chosen risk.
First autumn frost
no autumn frost
The far end of the outdoor season.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in São Paulo
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Tomatoes through the year
Against the frost risk in São Paulo
Why these dates
Six weeks of indoor growing produces a stocky transplant with a first flower truss forming. Starting earlier than eight weeks usually backfires: the plant becomes leggy and root-bound, and gains nothing on a plant sown later.
Tomato foliage is damaged at 0C and killed outright at about -1C. There is no recovery from a frosted plant, so the transplant date is the single most consequential decision in the tomato year.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Tomatoes are timed from 6 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 2 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for São Paulo.
Also in São Paulo
Other vegetables to time
Growing tomatoes in São Paulo
How much frost will tomatoes tolerate?
Tomato foliage is damaged at 0C and killed outright at about -1C. There is no recovery from a frosted plant, so the transplant date is the single most consequential decision in the tomato year.