Not sure what to grow in your summer vegetable garden? The bright sun and warm temperatures of summer are perfect for certain plants and herbs.

From rows of corn to beautiful blooms, find out what vegetables, herbs, and blooms to plant in a summer garden!

Summer Garden Season

The summer garden season is here, and we can’t wait to bite into some fresh, home grown produce! The variety of vegetables that can be grown in the summer garden is what keeps many gardeners growing and what entices new gardeners to try their hand at growing. The combination of hot weather and (hopefully) occasional rain makes summer a perfect time to grow.

While summer is best for many warm weather crops, always be sure to check your growing zone and recommendations on seed packages and plant tags. Summer here in zone 8b is quite different from someone gardening in zone 4.

Soil temperature as well as humidity and intensity of summer heat all play a factor in what grows well in everyone's area.

To find out your growing zone, check out the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone map for details.

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Summer Garden Favorites

Tomatoes

This classic summer "fruit" comes in vast varieties from tiny Tom Thumb tomatoes to large and juicy beefsteak, there's a tomato type for everyone. If you're needing help with growing tomatoes in the summer garden beds, check out these helpful articles:

Pole and Bush Beans

There are many varieties of bean to choose from, and green beans (aka string beans or snap beans) are the most popular. Perfect for the heat of summer, beans come in all shapes, colors and sizes. Try different varieties each year or use succession planting and rotate a few different varieties in one spring/summer garden.

Select a bush variety to grow in containers or small garden spaces. Runners or pole beans to grow well in gardens that have space for trellises or teepees. (Find out how to construct a bean teepee in 5 minutes!)

Beans are also perfect for getting kids into the garden. They love to harvest beans and eat them on the spot. See my complete guide on How to Grow Beans.

Corn

Nothing screams late summer like a sweet corn harvest. Corn is so easy to grow and prepare. It grows on tall stalks but requires very little vertical space.

Most corn stalks will produce two ears per stalk, and the ears are great for grilling or boiling. And though you may be used to seeing corn grown in fields and row gardens, they are just as happy to grow in a raised bed or container!

This peaches and cream corn is a fun one to try in the garden! Consider also growing the Three Sisters: Corn, pole beans (which grow up the corn stalks), and squash or zucchini, which stays lower to the ground and acts as a ground cover to keep in moisture. It’s an old classic companion planting favorite!

Sweet Potatoes

Perfect for planting in spring for a late summer harvest, this is one of the summer vegetables that truly is set it and forget it.

Sweet potato vines are beautiful on their own, but once slips are planted, the only maintenance they will need is water. You can also trim the potato vines if they are getting too long.

Sweet potatoes also store well all winter long, making this a good idea for the summer vegetable garden.

Eggplant

I know eggplant can be a divided topic, but hear me out. The star of several Italian recipes, eggplant is easy to grow and will add color to both your summer garden and your plate.

Plant any variety in a sunny location (in-ground or in a container) but not in the same location as it was grown in last year. If you live in a warmer climate, eggplant will continue to grow into the late fall, so don’t take it up too quickly!

I personally love to grow these white eggplant for their mild flavor.

Cantaloupe and Watermelon

What is summer without slices of juicy watermelon, cantaloupe or honeydew? It’s a great choice to plant and grow with kids as a summer gardening project.

Choose a variety based on the amount of garden space you have, like these sugar babies if you’re tight on space.

Compact plants won’t require as much growing space as traditional varieties, but will produce the same juicy melons. We grow our cantaloupe in a south-facing flower bed. This gives them plenty of room to spread out, and they run underneath our blueberry bushes, so they’re not in the way. (And they help cut down on the weeds!)

Okra

Here’s a full sun, heat loving vegetable that is the perfect tall plant to grow in a summer garden. Upright plants don’t take up much space and produce large yellow flowers before producing okra pods.

Harvest okra when pods are 4-5 inches long and add to soups, stews and gumbo. If you keep okra plants cut you'll have a bountiful harvest all summer long.

We love this Clemson Spineless, but there are endless varieties of okra to try!

Slice crosswise, dredge in cornmeal and fry until golden brown for a southern favorite or use my oven roasted okra recipe or this recipe for easy grilled okra. Okra is also incredibly easy to freeze for later use.

Peppers (Jalapeño and all others)

Peppers not only produce flavorful heat, they grow best in the hot summer. Perfect for growing outdoors in late spring, peppers thrive in the warm climate of summer.

These easy care plants grow equally well in-ground or in containers. There are also a multitude of varieties to try. Check out these helpful articles for growing peppers at home:

We always include lots of jalapeno, shishito, and bell peppers in our summer planting.

Sunflowers

While clearly not a vegetable, the edible seeds in sunflowers make them one of the summer crops the kids ask for. They make a perfect addition to any summer vegetable garden by bring in color, pollinators, and seeds!

Learn how to harvest sunflower seeds here and also how to roast them. Check out my full guide for How to Grow Sunflowers that takes you step-by-step through the process.

Cucumbers

Whether you just like to much on crunchy cucumbers or are looking to pickle some for eating year round, cucumbers are perfect for the summer months. Plant in soil rich in organic matter, and get a head start with a late spring planting to harvest even earlier in the summer.

Check out my step-by-step guide for How to Plant, Grow, and Harvest Cucumbers. They really are one of the easiest warm season plants to grow.

Squash and Zucchini

A staple of the summer garden, this large low plants can produce abundantly. From dark green zucchini to bright yellow crookneck squash, the summer varieties pack so much flavor and can give you enough squash for you and all the neighbors.

Plant after the last frost date, and be on the watch for squash vine borers, which can kill your plant in a matter of days. Thankfully, seed germination is pretty quick, so you can have successions of this crop if needed.

Check out my full guide on How to Plant, Grow, and Harvest Squash and Zucchini or How to Grow Squash in a Raised Bed Garden.

Now you know what to grow in a summer garden! (And take some risks and grow something you’ve never tried before.) So take up what is no longer producing from your early spring garden, and get some of these fresh summer veggies growing.

These heat loving plants should take your garden into the early fall (if you live in a warmer climate).

Are you new to vegetable gardening? If so, check out my FREE 5-day email series where I take you step-by-step through planning and setting up a garden. Click here to sign up!