Free & Open-Source Tool

Catch spacing mistakes, companion conflicts, and timing gaps — before you plant

Garden OS is a free raised bed planner with built-in layout logic. Drop crops onto your 8×4 grid and get instant scoring on sun, spacing, companions, and season fit — with plain-English explanations for every square.

Build Your Garden Plan See how it works
Open instantly — no signup, no download, no data collected
100% browser-based — your layout stays on your device
No account or install needed
Open source — zero tracking, zero ads
4×8 / 8×4 Bed Layouts
32 Cells Modeled
Explainable Placement Logic
Local-First Saved In Browser
garden-planner-v4.html
Tomato
Basil
Pepper
Eggplant
Lettuce
Carrot
Beans
8 × 4 Raised Bed — Spring Layout
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🥬
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☀️ Sun 94
🤝 Companion 88
📏 Spacing 76
📅 Season 91
✓ Tomato + Basil — excellent companions · Sun fit: 94
✓ Companion match
☀️ Full sun zone
Why This Exists

Stop guessing. Start knowing.

Fewer planting mistakes

The scoring engine flags bad companions, overcrowded squares, and shade conflicts before they cost you a season.

Setup-to-harvest guidance

One planner connects to build instructions, seasonal checklists, and maintenance schedules — not five disconnected apps.

Logic you can read

Every score comes with a plain-English explanation. You learn why a placement works, not just whether it does.

How It Works

From empty bed to harvest-ready
in three steps

No account, no backend, and no server round-trips. The core tools are browser-native HTML pages, and Story Mode is the richer runtime exception — but the whole system stays local-first.

📐

Plan a bed that works

Place crops on a grid that mirrors your real bed. Every square is scored for sun, spacing, companions, and timing — mistakes are flagged instantly.

🔨

Build the structure

Follow cut lists, hardware specs, and assembly steps for the 8×4 cattle panel cage. Designed so a weekend builder can finish without rework.

🌱

Run the season

Monthly checklists for planting, critter defense, maintenance, and harvest. The system you wished you had last spring.

The Planner

Every square gets
a reason to exist

The planner doesn't just place crops — it explains why each placement works or doesn't, so you learn as you design. Printable layouts. Saveable plans. Real logic, not decoration.

☀️

Sun exposure scoring

Each cell knows its position relative to trellises and tall crops. North-side shade is flagged before you plant.

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Companion intelligence

Tomato next to basil? Bonus. Tomato next to fennel? Warning. Every adjacency is scored with real companion data.

📅

Season-aware timing

The planner knows what month it is and adjusts scores for planting windows, frost dates, and succession opportunities.

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Plain-English explanations

No mystery scores. Click any cell and read exactly why it scored the way it did — in words, not just numbers.

🩺

Garden Doctor triage

Leaf curl, spots, holes, blossom drop, and wilt now route through a local-first symptom checker instead of a separate search spiral.

Live Score Breakdown

🍅 Tomato — Cell B2
Sun Fit
94
Companion
88
Spacing
76
Season Fit
91
Access
82
Protection
70
✓  Strong placement — basil neighbor boosts companion score. Consider trellis for better sun access to row behind.
📄 Printable layout · 💾 Save to browser · 📊 Score summary
Guides

Turn your plan into a real garden

Once the planner gives you a layout, these two guides take you from lumber to harvest.

🔨
Build

Cage Build Guide

Complete step-by-step instructions for the 8×4 ft cattle panel cage — lumber cuts, hardware list, assembly sequence, and trellis attachment.
📋
Operate

Seasonal Ops Guide

Planting zone checklists, critter defense protocols, monthly maintenance schedules, and harvest tracking for every season of the year.
The Result

A complete garden plan — not just a pretty grid

Scored bed layout

Every square has a score and explanation you can review before planting.

Printable plan

Take your layout to the hardware store or tape it inside your shed.

Build-ready dimensions

Lumber cuts, hardware lists, and assembly steps matched to your layout.

Seasonal playbook

Month-by-month checklists from first plant to last harvest.

✦ Optional: Narrative Mode

Want to learn by doing?
There's a story for that.

A 12-chapter campaign that walks you through a full garden year — decisions, seasonal shifts, and 3D yard staging tied to your actual plan. Start here if you prefer guided exploration over open-ended planning.

Enter Story Mode
01 The Yard Assessment Mar
02 First Bed Placement Mar
03 The Spring Planting Apr
04 Companion Strategy Apr
05 The Critter Problem May
06 Midsummer Audit Jun
… 6 more chapters through winter review
Product Proof

Built around practical raised-bed work,
not generic garden dashboards

Garden OS connects planning, reasoning, build guidance, and seasonal follow-through in one local-first system.

Cell-level scoring surfaces sun fit, spacing pressure, companion effects, and seasonal timing before planting day.
P
Explainable Planner
Reasoning you can inspect square by square
Opaque scores replaced with readable tradeoffs
The planner feeds directly into cage-build and ops guides, so a saved layout can become a real bed, maintenance routine, and harvest workflow.
B
Planner-To-Build Path
Layout, structure, operations, and follow-through
One system instead of disconnected docs and apps
The root tools stay browser-native and zero-backend, while Story Mode extends the same garden logic into a richer guided runtime.
L
Local-First Runtime
No account, no server dependency, GitHub Pages deploy
Planner and runtime stay aligned to the same garden model
Designed for 4×8 and 8×4 beds · Explainable scoring and guides · Zero-backend and local-first

Your spring planting window is open

The planner takes five minutes. The mistakes it catches last a whole season.

Build Your Garden Plan →
Open in browser · No account · Local-first
Ready to plan? The planner is free and runs in your browser. Open Planner