Growing Gai Lan (Chinese Broccoli): A Complete Profile
By Growing Home Greens Team · August 10, 2026
Gai lan, also called Chinese broccoli or kailaan, is grown for its thick, tender flowering stalks rather than a dense broccoli head, with a milder, slightly sweeter flavor than standard broccoli.
Direct-seed and succession sow
Direct-seed from spring through midsummer, sowing 15 seeds per foot a quarter inch deep in rows 12 to 18 inches apart. Succession sow every 7 to 10 days for continuous harvests rather than one large flush.
Timing the cut
Harvest when the flower buds are just mature, or when a few have just started to open; waiting for a fuller bloom produces tougher, less desirable stems. Unlike komatsuna’s single-cut harvest, gai lan is a repeat-harvest crop: cutting the main stalk encourages side shoots to develop, giving multiple pickings from the same planting rather than one and done.
Gai lan has no well-established companion pairings, and nothing it needs to be kept away from. At 4 plants per square foot, it’s a repeat-cut brassica for the Garden Designer, useful for stretching a single planting across a longer harvest window than most brassicas allow.
Source: Asian Greens: Key Growing Information, Johnny’s Selected Seeds.
Companion planting guide for Gai Lan (Chinese Broccoli) · Find your planting dates
Typically viable in USDA zones 2-11. Not sure your zone? Look it up by ZIP code.
Mature height: 1-1.5 ft
Method: Direct sow: Direct-sow outside. It doesn't transplant well, or doesn't need the extra time indoors.
When to plant gai lan (Chinese broccoli), by zone
Every zone gai lan (Chinese broccoli) 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2a & 2b | Not usually | May 6–May 13 | Jun 20–Jun 27 |
| 3a & 3b | Not usually | May 16–May 23 | Jun 30–Jul 7 |
| 4a & 4b | Not usually | May 1–May 8 | Jun 15–Jun 22 |
| 5a & 5b | Not usually | Apr 26–May 3 | Jun 10–Jun 17 |
| 6a & 6b | Not usually | Apr 11–Apr 18 | May 26–Jun 2 |
| 7a & 7b | Not usually | Mar 27–Apr 3 | May 11–May 18 |
| 8a & 8b | Not usually | Mar 11–Mar 18 | Apr 25–May 2 |
| 9a & 9b | Not usually | Feb 1–Feb 8 | Mar 18–Mar 25 |
| 10a & 10b | Not usually | Jan 16–Jan 23 | Mar 2–Mar 9 |
| 11a & 11b | Not usually | Dec 18–Dec 25 | Feb 1–Feb 8 |
Harvest dates are about 45 days after the sow or plant-out date.
Zone 2 sows before zone 3 here, which looks wrong and is not. USDA zones rank winter cold, not season length, and zone 2 is mostly interior Alaska, where hard winters come with warm summers. More on what a zone measures.
See exact start-indoors, direct-sow, and harvest dates for your zone →
How many Gai Lan (Chinese Broccoli) plants fit per square foot?
Spacing: 4 per square foot (square-foot-gardening spacing). Mature height: 1-1.5 ft.
Good companions for gai lan (Chinese broccoli)
- Radish: Radish (including the daikon form) is a documented trap crop for flea beetles, which prefer its mustard oils over other brassicas and can be sacrificed or pulled once infested: the same research cited on the radish page.
Full companion guide, including what to keep away from gai lan (Chinese broccoli) →
Varieties worth considering
- Straight-species gai lan (Brassica oleracea var. alboglabra): Johnny's Selected Seeds sells this variety plain, without competing named cultivars; the growing method and stalk quality are traits of the variety itself. (source)
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 gai lan seeds
None of the seed suppliers we list carries gai lan seeds right now. A local garden center or a specialty seed house is the place to look.
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See it growing
Search YouTube for "growing gai lan (Chinese broccoli)" videos → (a live search, not a hand-picked video; results vary and aren't vetted by us)
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Growing Gai Lan (Chinese Broccoli): Grown for its thick, tender flowering stalks rather than a dense broccoli head, a repeat-harvest crop unlike most brassicas here.
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