Growing Fava Beans: A Complete Profile
By Growing Home Greens Team · July 25, 2026
Fava beans (also called broad beans) look and grow like nothing else in the bean family. Where snap and pole beans want warm soil and hate frost, fava beans want cool weather and go in the ground earliest of any bean you’ll grow.
Sowing it as soon as the soil can be worked
Direct-sow seed 1 inch deep as soon as the soil can be worked in spring. There’s no need to wait for the last frost date the way you would with bush or pole beans. Where winters stay above 10°F, fava beans can also be sown in late summer for an overwintered crop that resumes growth in spring. Expect harvest around 75-79 days from sowing.
Heat is the enemy, not cold
Disease pressure and poor pod set climb fast once daytime temperatures push past 80°F, so a late, hot spring is the main thing that goes wrong. Get seed in the ground early rather than treating it like a warm-season bean. A heat-tolerant variety like ‘Vroma’ buys some insurance if your spring is unpredictable, but early sowing still does more of the work than variety choice alone. Aphids are also a common visitor to the tender growing tips; pinching those tips once plants are flowering well both discourages aphids and redirects energy into pod fill.
The earliest bed-filler ahead of a warm-season crop
Like other legumes, fava beans fix their own nitrogen, so they’re a good crop to precede a heavy feeder in rotation. Because they’re planted and harvested earlier than most other beans, they also make a useful early-season bed-filler ahead of a warm-season crop planted in the same spot later on.
Sources: Fava Bean Key Growing Information, Johnny’s Selected Seeds; Vroma Fava Bean Seed, Johnny’s Selected Seeds.
Companion planting guide for Fava Bean (Broad Bean) · Find your planting dates
Typically viable in USDA zones 3-10. Not sure your zone? Look it up by ZIP code.
Mature height: 2-4 ft
Method: Direct sow: Direct-sow outside. It doesn't transplant well, or doesn't need the extra time indoors.
When to plant fava bean (broad bean), by zone
Every zone fava bean (broad bean) grows in. Pick your zone in the header and it will be highlighted here. Each zone links to its full page.
| Zone | Start indoors | Sow or plant out | Harvest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3a & 3b | Not usually | May 9–May 16 | Jul 25–Aug 1 |
| 4a & 4b | Not usually | Apr 24–May 1 | Jul 10–Jul 17 |
| 5a & 5b | Not usually | Apr 19–Apr 26 | Jul 5–Jul 12 |
| 6a & 6b | Not usually | Apr 4–Apr 11 | Jun 20–Jun 27 |
| 7a & 7b | Not usually | Mar 20–Mar 27 | Jun 5–Jun 12 |
| 8a & 8b | Not usually | Mar 4–Mar 11 | May 20–May 27 |
| 9a & 9b | Not usually | Jan 25–Feb 1 | Apr 12–Apr 19 |
| 10a & 10b | Not usually | Jan 9–Jan 16 | Mar 27–Apr 3 |
Harvest dates are about 77 days after the sow or plant-out date.
See exact start-indoors, direct-sow, and harvest dates for your zone →
How many Fava Bean (Broad Bean) plants fit per square foot?
Spacing: 4 per square foot (square-foot-gardening spacing). Mature height: 2-4 ft.
Good companions for fava bean (broad bean)
- Cabbage: Fixes nitrogen that heavy-feeding cabbage uses, the same mechanism bush beans provide cucumbers. Fava is a cool-season legume, though, so the overlap only works where both are in the ground at once: an overwintered fava or an early spring one, not a summer planting.
Full companion guide, including what to keep away from fava bean (broad bean) →
Varieties worth considering
- 'Vroma': Johnny's Selected Seeds bred it for heat tolerance and lodging resistance, the two things most likely to go wrong with fava beans if spring turns hot before the pods are set. It also holds up better than old-standard Broad Windsor types when a late planting runs into warm weather rather than the cool stretch fava beans want. (source)
- 'Sweet Lorane': Territorial Seed selected this one in the mid-1980s specifically for cold tolerance and flavor, small-seeded (45 per ounce, against Broad Windsor's 15) and quick-cooking. It can be fall-sown in zones 6 and up for an overwintered crop maturing in late May, the earliest possible harvest of the three here. (source)
- 'Broad Windsor': The old-standard type Vroma is bred to outperform in heat: large buff seeds, a sturdy 4-foot bush, hardy to 12°F. Territorial rates it at 80 days from direct seeding. Grow it if you want the biggest individual beans rather than Sweet Lorane's smaller, faster ones. (source) Buy seeds: True Leaf Market
Why each variety is listed comes from the source shown next to it. We haven't grown these ourselves yet, so treat this as a research-backed starting point, not a personal endorsement. The buy links are separate from those sources: they go to seed suppliers that sell that exact variety, and we may earn a commission on some of them.
Where to buy fava bean seeds
True Leaf Market (each supplier's fava bean seeds)
The varieties we recommend above each have their own buy links, for the suppliers that sell that exact variety.
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Some links on this page also go to other retailers we may earn a commission from as an affiliate, at no extra cost to you. We only recommend products with a clear consensus of positive, independent reviews, or ones we bought and use ourselves. Each item on our gear page says which.
See it growing
Search YouTube for "growing fava bean (broad bean)" videos → (a live search, not a hand-picked video; results vary and aren't vetted by us)
%3A%20A%20cool-season%20legume%20planted%20extra%20early%2C%20unlike%20every%20other%20bean%20in%20the%20garden%2C%20with%20picks%20for%20cold%20tolerance%20and%20heat%20tolerance.)
Pin this for later
Growing Fava Bean (Broad Bean): A cool-season legume planted extra early, unlike every other bean in the garden, with picks for cold tolerance and heat tolerance.
Save to Pinterest