Article updated on 11th March 2025 – Revised retailers Most of us realise (and accept) the internet is changing our behaviour in many different ways and buying plants or seeds for the home garden is one them! I think the move towards online plants and seeds is a good change for consumers and retailers.

I understand some people may have reservations about buying live plants (including cuttings) online but this method has come a long way over the past decade to become much safer for three main reasons: A) Improvements in parcel postal services; B) Better packaging of the plants being sent by the seller; and C) Better online fraud protection when paying with credit cards or PayPal. I buy most of my plants online, and I’m happy to say I have never had an incident where my plants arrived dead or did not arrive. I’m not saying mistakes don’t happen. Still, I will defend buying live plants online from my experience as a low-risk venture as long as you buy from a reputable or researched seller (more about those criteria later in this article).

Typical packaging of a fruit tree sent in the post from an online seller (image above)

Why buying plants online is growing in popularity

Yes, there will always be a place for nurseries, Sunday markets, and the odd garden expo to buy and sell plants in person, but the trade in purchasing plants online is growing like a beanstalk. However, before I detail some of the BEST places to buy plants and seeds online, first let’s look at the reasons WHY buying plants online is becoming so popular:

  • Choice – Shopping online opens up a world of nurseries congregated together on a person’s PC or handheld device, so if it’s a specific type of plant you’re after or a more significant variety of products (like seeds) to browse, then the internet is for you. It’s impossible to physically visit every plant or seed seller on the planet in person (even just the ones in your area would take a day); however, with our “friend” Google or whatever search engine or AI thingy you use we have a to more retailers online to browse plants and buy them in just a few clicks! Also, how many plant retailers have you seen selling the same stuff? There’s a much bigger choice for plants online, and combined with auction sites such as eBay or Amazon, there’s now even more sellers, such as hobby growers, who can make their backyards a virtual mini nursery.
  • Convenience – I guess the first point (choice) touched on this, but what could be more convenient than surfing the internet on your home PC or mobile device to get the plants you want? You look at the Website’s available product lists, select your plants, buy them, and in a few days the postman delivers the plants to your doorstep – easy. This is a particularly convenient way to purchase plants for those who are busy or unable to get to the nursery, such as the disabled, easily.
  • Discovery – If it weren’t for buying over the internet, I wouldn’t have known half of the food plants in my garden today even existed. The internet isn’t just a great tool for finding information on rare plants; it can also allow us to find where they are and buy them. Hunting for new plants to grow that you have never tried before is fun and exciting, and in my opinion, there’s no better way to do this than via online shopping.
  • Price – Online shopping has undoubtedly lowered the overall cost of plants. Yes, I know we are in a cost-of-living crisis, but plants are cheaper due to the online boom. You would think buying plants or seeds online would mean they are more expensive due to the extra postage costs, but generally, this is not the case. Backyard sellers with small overheads can afford to sell plants and seeds much cheaper than traditional stores.

What are some of the best places to buy plants and seeds online?

Let’s break this list down into country locations: the USA, Australia, and the UK, since I have the most information about these countries regarding online plant retailers. Naturally, I will recommend just a few of the leading sellers I’m familiar with, but feel free to research and find more!

USA online plant and seed retailers 

The following is a small list (including the link to their Website) of online plant and/or seed sellers in the USA:

  • Survival Seeds USA and Australia—The link in the title takes you to their Linktree, and you can navigate from there. I work with Survival Seeds, and we have an affiliate arrangement. Use Code SSM at checkout for a 10% discount. Stuart, the founder of Survival Seeds, started his online family business during COVID-19 when he found it difficult to get seeds due to the whole world going collective green thumb. The idea was to give people an easy way to buy seeds in bulk online, so if the proverbial hit the fan, they had the seed stock ready to go. This year (2025) Stuart teamed up with Victory Seeds in Texas and set up an online store in the USA. At this point, I’ve been using Survival Seeds in our garden for over 6 months and finding the germination rates are excellent. The one thing I wish they had was more variety of seeds but I understand they are slowly getting there and will build their list over time.
  • eBay USA – Has become one of the best places to buy live plants and seeds online. Type any plant or seed into the search bar, and you’ll find more varieties than you could ever imagine! The best thing I like about shopping on eBay for plants and seeds is the hobby sellers because these individual “backyardists” have the most outstanding selection of rare and interesting food plants to choose, and I could spend hours scrolling through their selections. If you are concerned about buying from eBay plant sellers, you shouldn’t be… All you need to do is check the seller’s reputation (available next to the product) and also check out the background of their reliability via feedback they receive from buyers (contained in the feedback area).
  • Amazon USA – Is very similar to eBay and often has many similar live plants or seeds for sale, but it does pay to check out their Website because they do offer different products also. Again, Amazon has a rating and review system as a way for buyers to research the products and sellers they’re interested in before purchasing. Both Amazon & eBay haven’t got big from being “big” they’re successful because they generally provide a good safe online platform for people to easily buy and sell products.
  • Direct Gardening – is based in Bloomington, Illinois, and sells a wide range of food and ornamental plants, plus seeds. They are mostly food crop oriented (which is what interests me most), so for people in the USA who are into vegetable gardening, have a browse of their Website.
  • Gardeners Supply Company – Not only sell live plants and seeds but they also stock lots of gardening equipment and other products. What’s even more impressive is their up-to-date Website “culture” whereby they just don’t sell stuff they actually maintain a regular gardening blog plus provide an “ask us” service for people requiring answers to their gardening questions. I like it when businesses show this type of commitment and extra customer focus.
  • Mountain Valley Seed Company – Mainly focuses on edible produce seeds with some ornamental products (flowers). They also stock a modest amount of supplies for growing seedlings etc. Interestingly, Mountain Valley has a whole category dedicated to micro greens, which is pretty trendy and something I’m personally right into growing.
  • Brighter Blooms Nursery – Based in Fort Mill, Southern California these guys have a very impressive website with an easy to follow design and good information content such as growing conditions on each product page to help with the purchasing decision. Apparently, Brighter Blooms is fast emerging as one of the biggest online plant retailers in the USA with a huge selection of shrubs and trees. Their selection of fruit trees caught my eye and if I lived in the USA there’s no doubt I would be shopping on their Website.

UK online plant and seed retailers

The following is a small list (including the link to their Website) of online plant and/or seed sellers in the UK:

  • eBay UK – Has a great selection of plants and seeds but perhaps not as many as eBay USA or Australia; nevertheless, it’s worth a browse. One thing I should mention (as a negative I guess) is the unfortunate way Chinese and other foreign country sellers have tried to tap into the ever-growing popular eBay plant and seed market by offering varieties of plants with ridiculous traits such as: over huge tomatoes, blue strawberries, oversized berries etc, my advice is to buy plants or seeds from sellers who reside in your own country and if you’re going to buy products from China then stick to electronics!
  • Amazon UK – Has an excellent selection of fruit trees, vegetables, and seeds (I wish we had the same kind of online store here in Oz). What I really like about the Amazon setup is the easy access to product ratings, which makes it much safer to purchase products knowing others have done successfully before you.
  • Jersey Plants or Gardening Direct – Both domains lead to the same Website with a huge selection of plants and seeds. They offer free postage on their products with no minimum spend, and I think that is pretty good because you can get an idea straight up what the overall cost will be without getting stung at the end on checkout.
  • Garden Bargains – Has a well-organised Website and even their own TV show on the TV Info FTA circuit. They have a good range of live plants in particular fruit trees suited to the UK climate.
  • Gardening Express – They seem to be concentrating on ornamentals at the moment with few choices in their fruit & veg categories but they do offer a 5-year warranty on their plants, which is quite shall we say… brave.
  • Keen Gardener – Sells seeds for food and ornamental plants; however, this online gardening site is more geared to gardening equipment. It’s a nice professional online shop and worth browsing.
  • Marshalls – The Vegetable & Fruit Company – I love the set-up of their Website. Right from the homepage, you can tell they’re into food crops with glossy magazine images and easy navigation hints to find your way around. Marshalls has a great selection of seeds and live plants – makes me wish I lived in the UK just so I could buy from them!
  • Seeds 4 Garden – Such a simple name leaving no doubt what they sell but the interesting thing about this online seed seller is they’re actually based in Holland and actively market to the UK (and several other countries). They have a good selection of seeds and pride themselves on excellent quality so definitely worth a peek.
  • Suttons Seeds – Not just a very good seed seller they also sell grafted vegetable plants, which you don’t see online very often, so I’d recommend surfing their Website for this reason alone. Suttons also sells trees, shrubs, gardening equipment, greenhouses, and heaps of stuff – it’s a good site!

Australian online plant and seed retailers (some also post international)

The following is a small list (including the link to their Website) of online plant and/or seed sellers in Australia:

  • Survival Seeds USA and Australia—The link in the title takes you to their Linktree, and you can navigate from there. I work with Survival Seeds, and we have an affiliate arrangement. Use Code SSM at checkout for a 10% discount. Stuart, the founder of Survival Seeds, started his online family business during COVID-19 when he found it difficult to get seeds due to the whole world going collective green thumb. The idea was to give people an easy way to buy seeds in bulk online, so if the proverbial hit the fan, they had the seed stock ready to go.
  • Amazon Australia— Unfortunately, the online store giant does not sell plants in Australia because, for some reason, it will only sell books to Aussies. Amazon does, however, have a wide range of gardening books that can be purchased in hard copy or downloaded for Kindle, etc. Also, they are now selling seeds, which they did not do a few years back when I started this list.
  • Daley’s Fruit Tree Nursery— I’ve purchased many fruit trees from these guys. Their fruit trees are always delivered quickly and professionally packaged. I’ve never had an issue with Daley’s products being delivered to my door. The only gripe I do have is that they are often out of stock, and sometimes waiting on pre-orders for certain fruit trees can be long.
  • eBay Australia – Is where I get most of my seeds online and spend a lot of time browsing for new food plants to grow. I enjoy the eBay backyard hobby seed and plant seller community because of the choices and the commitment of these individuals to their small personal online businesses. Most sellers aim to please and take pride in the products they create to sell, which harnesses a superb online environment to buy seeds and plants.
  • Garden Express – Claims to be Australia’s largest online nursery, offering an extensive catalogue of food and ornamental plants. Their categories and product lists are easy to follow and clearly show what plants are currently in stock and out of season (unavailable). I have purchased from Garden Express several times without problems, but their website can be glitchy. Also, they are often out of stock even during the season.
  • Green Harvest – is one of my favourite online seed shops. They’re based in Maleny, QLD and have a large selection of seeds, bulbs, smaller plants, organic pest control products, and other gardening equipment. I like how Green Harvest strives to collect and sell many seeds that are rare or not widely sold anywhere else, so it makes for an interesting site to browse when looking for something new to try in the garden. Unfortunately, their online store closed last year (2024), only to give notice that they will reopen again in 2025. I can only guess that the owners decided to retire (or something) and then either had a change of heart or decided to sell the business rather than shutting down cold. It’s good to see them staying in the online plants market.
  • Fair Dinkum Seeds – Contacted me after seeing this article and I’m pleased to announce they also offer our readers a discount when purchasing from their online store! Simply enter the coupon code “selfsufficientme” at checkout to get a whopping 15% discount on your order + free postage! They also post internationally at a capped postage rate so that sounds like a great deal to me – go check out their store. By the way, I don’t receive any affiliate earnings from sales in case you were wondering so that’s probably why the 15% discount is so generous! If I do have one criticism, it is how their product list on their website can’t be sorted by what’s in or out of stock. I always find it annoying clicking through to a product only to find it out of stock.
  • Diggers – One of the first seed and plant companies to use the postage service to deliver items to their members, established in 1978. Today, the Diggers Club is still a leading online and postal plant/seed company with deep community roots (pardon the pun). I have purchased from Diggers before and been happy with the product. I’m not overly keen on the “membership model” whereby you pay a membership fee to claim better discounts. Still, many others disagree with me because this seller is very popular and good on them!
  • The Seed Collection—Recommended by Jane (from our Facebook Page comments), this seed company emphasises that its seeds are heirloom, open-pollinated, non-hybrid, and non-GMO, and it doesn’t use chemical treatments. Plus, its packaging is plain and environmentally friendly. This online store has a vast catalog of seeds, and its website is excellently laid out. You can even sort the seeds by what to sow now in your climate zone.
  • White House Nursery—I’ve purchased plants and seeds from these guys and was extremely happy with my order. They are based in Victoria and have many fruiting and ornamental plants.
  • Organic Seeds Australia – I’ve only recently started purchasing seeds from this retailer and like them! Not all of their seeds are non-hybrid, but most are, and not only that, you’ll find seeds here that are not easy to find elsewhere. For example, they sell new varieties of seed that are organically cross-bred (the old way, but modern) to produce new types of “heirloom” plants that backyard growers can use and save the seed again for re-growing. Commercial seed production and plant breeding designed for the backyard grower is becoming increasingly rare. Most big seed businesses only produce hybrid seeds that will not contain true-to-type seeds for re-sowing, aimed chiefly at farmers for supermarket produce.

Tips for buying seeds and live plants online

Seeds – Sending seeds via post is pretty simple (usually in an envelope) and besides quarantine laws between states, there’s nothing much to worry about. Generally, seeds are inexpensive so the loss isn’t great if they do get lost or stolen but in my experience, this doesn’t happen very often all. I’ve purchased and successfully received seeds here in Australia from the USA and Europe without problems; although, I recommend buying them from within your own country where possible.

Plants – As I stated at the beginning of this article, buying plants online has improved dramatically over the past 10 years to a point where most sellers and the postal services are competent enough to get your plants to you on time and alive. When it comes to plant quality, although I’m a fan of buying from backyard hobbyists, you should be aware that some of these sellers may not have as much knowledge in plant reproduction as professional nurseries, therefore, the risk of getting say… a grafted fruit tree, which isn’t grafted well or perhaps made with poor rootstock is increased compared to buying from a registered professional nursery. Having said that, I don’t believe the risk of buying a dud plant from backyard sellers is high at all but I simply wanted to raise the point.

When you do receive your plants make sure you follow the instructions from the seller on how to care for them. You should open the box ASAP after delivery and place them in your own nursery or recovery area, give them a water, and let them recuperate from the journey before planting out.

Overseas – You can buy seeds from overseas sellers but you should be aware certain customs and quarantine laws prevent certain seeds from entering your country for various reasons. I limit my purchases from overseas to well-known vegetable varieties like tomatoes, carrots, regular vegetables, etc because they will likely get through the post no problems; whereas, exotics or little-known plant species may get blocked. It’s for this reason, that I recommend the majority of your seed purchases should be from sellers within your own country or indeed in certain countries (such as Australia) you might have to stick to buying seeds within your own state due to strict quarantine laws.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, buying seeds and plants online is not a scary experience or something to be worried about. On the contrary, online shopping for plants is a fun, exciting, and enjoyable thing to do that might even save you some money.

I encourage you to visit the online seed and plant stores detailed above and feel free to use our comments section below to post links to your favourite eBay or Amazon sellers or any other Websites you’d like to recommend.

Happy online plant & seed shopping!