Ground cover plants against weeds: which goes where, and how many you need

A ground cover keeps weeds out once it has closed up: until then, usually for two or three summers, it needs mulch and weeding. Under trees and in shade, lesser periwinkle, bigroot geranium, barrenwort, barren strawberry and Japanese spurge do best; in sunny, dry places stonecrops, thymes and creeping junipers. Most perennial ground covers take 9-18 plants per square metre. The tables work out what a square metre costs at today's shop prices in your country.

Updated: October 24, 2026 · Data and prices from our plant database, worked out for your country. How our data is made

The same ground under a tree at planting, one summer later and with a closed ground cover — As long as soil shows between the plants, it needs mulch and weeding; under a closed carpet weed seeds no longer come up.

What keeps the weeds away?

Weed seeds germinate in light. A closed ground cover shades the soil, so the seeds do not come up, and those that do weaken under the dense leaves. As long as bare soil shows between the plants, weeds move in there too, so in the first years a ground cover does not save work yet; it does later.

Only a plant that keeps its leaves in winter holds weeds back all year. A deciduous ground cover such as hosta dies back in autumn and comes up late in spring, and until then the weeds get a head start. That is why the tables below list only evergreen and semi-evergreen ground covers up to 60 cm tall.

Before planting, clear the soil of perennial weeds. Couch grass, field bindweed and creeping thistle regrow from a piece of root and grow on through the ground cover; later the only way to get them out is to lift the ground cover too.
After planting, spread 5-7 cm of bark mulch between the plants (in sunny, dry spots, among stonecrops and thyme, fine gravel instead). It holds weeds back and keeps the soil moist until the plants close up.
In the first two or three years, weed once a month and pull weeds while they are small. Once the ground cover has closed, a few times a year is enough.
Plant in autumn or spring. A perennial planted in autumn roots in before winter and starts sooner in spring; ice plants, which are more tender, and grey-leaved plants are best planted in spring.

Under trees and in shade

Under a tree there is not only shade but drought too: the roots take the water and the canopy catches the rain. The ground cover there has to take both shade and moderate drought. The safest are lesser periwinkle, bigroot geranium (the most drought-tolerant), yellow barrenwort, barren strawberry and Japanese spurge. Bugle also belongs in shade but wants moist soil: under a dry tree it thins out.

Creeping thyme and stonecrop do not belong under a tree, however good they look in a picture. Both want sun and loose, dry soil; in shade they get leggy, thin out and rot under the fallen leaves.

Lesser periwinkle — For dry shade under trees: lesser periwinkle, bigroot geranium, yellow barrenwort and barren strawberry.

Bigroot geranium — For dry shade under trees: lesser periwinkle, bigroot geranium, yellow barrenwort and barren strawberry.

Aaron's beard

Semi-evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 30–60 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 6 (45 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €22

Greater periwinkle

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 15–45 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 7 (40 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €25

Bigroot geranium

Semi-evergreen

Height: 30–50 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 7 (40 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €28

Lesser periwinkle

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 10–20 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 9 (35 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €28

Yellow archangel

Semi-evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 30–60 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 7 (40 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €35

Red barrenwort

Semi-evergreen

Height: 20–35 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €37

Wood spurge

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging · toxic

Height: 30–60 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 6 (45 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €39

Spotted dead-nettle

Semi-evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 10–25 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €41

Barren strawberry

Evergreen

Height: 10–20 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €45

Japanese spurge

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 18 (25 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €64

Mossy saxifrage

Evergreen

Height: 10–23 cm
Drought tolerance: Low
Plants per square metre: 18 (25 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €74

Foamflower

Semi-evergreen

Height: 15–45 cm
Drought tolerance: Low
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €79

Plant	Height	Drought tolerance	Plants per square metre	Price per square metre
Aaron's beard Semi-evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	30–60 cm	Medium	6 45 cm apart	€22
Greater periwinkle Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	15–45 cm	Medium	7 40 cm apart	€25
Bigroot geranium Semi-evergreen	30–50 cm	High	7 40 cm apart	€28
Lesser periwinkle Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	10–20 cm	Medium	9 35 cm apart	€28
Yellow archangel Semi-evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	30–60 cm	Medium	7 40 cm apart	€35
Red barrenwort Semi-evergreen	20–35 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€37
Wood spurge Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging · toxic	30–60 cm	High	6 45 cm apart	€39
Spotted dead-nettle Semi-evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	10–25 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€41
Barren strawberry Evergreen	10–20 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€45
Japanese spurge Evergreen	15–30 cm	Medium	18 25 cm apart	€64
Mossy saxifrage Evergreen	10–23 cm	Low	18 25 cm apart	€74
Foamflower Semi-evergreen	15–45 cm	Low	13 30 cm apart	€79

The table shows the ground covers that take full shade, the cheapest square metre first. The price per square metre is today's shop price of the usual pot size times the plants per square metre.

Do not pile thick soil under a tree, as its roots suffocate beneath it: spread no more than 5 cm of compost on the surface, and keep clear of the trunk. Do not dig everything over; plant small potted plants between the roots with a trowel. Water regularly for the first two summers, even in shade, until the ground cover has rooted.

Common ivy is also a good ground cover in the deepest shade, but it climbs the tree too: keep it away from the trunk or cut it back every year.

For sunny, dry places

Slopes, gravel areas and the strip along a path or wall need a ground cover that survives full sun and summer drought without watering. Good ones are Kamchatka and Caucasian stonecrop, lemon thyme, wild thyme and snow-in-summer. They like loose, free-draining soil: on heavy clay that stays wet in winter they rot.

Per square metre the cheapest are creeping juniper, Japanese garden juniper and carpet cotoneaster, as a single plant covers half a square metre to a whole one. They close more slowly and need mulch between them for three or four years, but they also hold the soil of a slope.

Creeping juniper

Evergreen

Height: 15–45 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 1 (100 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €9.20

Carpet cotoneaster

Evergreen

Height: 10–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 3 (60 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €9.60

Japanese garden juniper

Evergreen

Height: 20–45 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 2 (80 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €16

Myrtle spurge

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging · toxic

Height: 10–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 7 (40 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €28

Rock rose

Evergreen

Height: 10–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 7 (40 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €28

Kamchatka stonecrop

Semi-evergreen

Height: 8–18 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €31

Common thyme

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €37

Lamb's ear

Semi-evergreen

Height: 20–50 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 9 (35 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €38

Lemon thyme

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €43

Cheddar pink

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €44

Snow-in-summer

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €50

Mountain rock cress

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: High
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €50

Plant	Height	Drought tolerance	Plants per square metre	Price per square metre
Creeping juniper Evergreen	15–45 cm	High	1 100 cm apart	€9.20
Carpet cotoneaster Evergreen	10–30 cm	High	3 60 cm apart	€9.60
Japanese garden juniper Evergreen	20–45 cm	High	2 80 cm apart	€16
Myrtle spurge Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging · toxic	10–30 cm	High	7 40 cm apart	€28
Rock rose Evergreen	10–30 cm	High	7 40 cm apart	€28
Kamchatka stonecrop Semi-evergreen	8–18 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€31
Common thyme Evergreen	15–30 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€37
Lamb's ear Semi-evergreen	20–50 cm	High	9 35 cm apart	€38
Lemon thyme Evergreen	15–30 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€43
Cheddar pink Evergreen	15–30 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€44
Snow-in-summer Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	15–30 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€50
Mountain rock cress Evergreen	15–30 cm	High	13 30 cm apart	€50

For part shade and moist soil

Where the spot is sunny or in part shade but the soil does not dry out (a watered garden, the edge of a bed, the east side of the house), the choice is widest. For a spring carpet of flowers moss phlox is good, for summer flowers Serbian bellflower, under shrubs bearberry cotoneaster. Winter heath flowers in winter; heather needs acid soil.

Bearberry cotoneaster

Evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 20–45 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 3 (60 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €13

Heather

Evergreen

Height: 10–60 cm
Drought tolerance: Low
Plants per square metre: 9 (35 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €41

Serbian bellflower

Semi-evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 10–30 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €45

Maiden pink

Evergreen

Height: 15–40 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €46

Dalmatian bellflower

Semi-evergreen

Height: 8–20 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €50

Creeping Jenny

Semi-evergreen

spreads hard, needs an edging

Height: 5–10 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €50

Winter heath

Evergreen

Height: 15–30 cm
Drought tolerance: Low
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €59

Rose rock cress

Evergreen

Height: 10–20 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 18 (25 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €63

Aubrieta

Evergreen

Height: 5–15 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 13 (30 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €64

Moss phlox

Evergreen

Height: 10–15 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 9 (35 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €66

Adriatic bellflower

Semi-evergreen

Height: 8–20 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 18 (25 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €72

Tufted phlox

Evergreen

Height: 5–15 cm
Drought tolerance: Medium
Plants per square metre: 18 (25 cm apart)
Price per square metre: €81

Plant	Height	Drought tolerance	Plants per square metre	Price per square metre
Bearberry cotoneaster Evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	20–45 cm	Medium	3 60 cm apart	€13
Heather Evergreen	10–60 cm	Low	9 35 cm apart	€41
Serbian bellflower Semi-evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	10–30 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€45
Maiden pink Evergreen	15–40 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€46
Dalmatian bellflower Semi-evergreen	8–20 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€50
Creeping Jenny Semi-evergreen spreads hard, needs an edging	5–10 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€50
Winter heath Evergreen	15–30 cm	Low	13 30 cm apart	€59
Rose rock cress Evergreen	10–20 cm	Medium	18 25 cm apart	€63
Aubrieta Evergreen	5–15 cm	Medium	13 30 cm apart	€64
Moss phlox Evergreen	10–15 cm	Medium	9 35 cm apart	€66
Adriatic bellflower Semi-evergreen	8–20 cm	Medium	18 25 cm apart	€72
Tufted phlox Evergreen	5–15 cm	Medium	18 25 cm apart	€81

Can a ground cover replace the lawn?

Where you do not walk, yes. A ground cover needs no mowing and grows where a lawn will not: under trees, in a shady corner, on a steep slope. A ground cover planted in place of lawn needs as many plants as anywhere else, and the same weeding in the first two years.

No ground cover takes treading the way grass does. Wild thyme and Irish moss put up with the odd step, but where you walk every day you need stepping stones. Where children play or the dog runs, keep the grass.

You find all ground covers in the ground cover plants list, and those for shade in ground cover plants for shade, with filters.

How many plants, and how to save?

The number comes from the planting distance. Set the plants in a triangular pattern, in staggered rows: at 25 cm apart you need about 18 plants per square metre, at 30 cm about 13, at 35 cm about 9, at 40 cm about 7. At this density a ground cover closes in two or three summers.

Triangular planting: every plant is the same distance from its neighbours, and the rows are offset by half the planting distance.

Plant further apart and wait a year or two longer. At one and a half times the distance you need fewer than half the plants, but you mulch and weed for longer. This works well with fast spreaders (periwinkle, dead-nettle, bugle) and hardly with slow ones (barrenwort, Japanese spurge).
Buy smaller pots. A perennial ground cover from a small 9 cm pot catches up with a larger one within a year, and it is easier to plant between roots.
Divide what you have. Clumps of bigroot geranium, periwinkle and barrenwort can be split in spring or autumn: one strong plant makes three or four.

Our garden planner also counts ground cover from each plant's planting distance, among the other plants, with quantities and prices for your country.

The ones that spread too well

The fastest ground covers do not stop at the edge of their spot. Greater periwinkle, yellow archangel, Aaron's beard, creeping Jenny and bugle spread by runners or suckers into the lawn and the next bed. They are marked in the tables: next to a lawn, plant them only behind an edging sunk 15-20 cm deep, and do not dump their clippings at a woodland edge or a stream bank, where they take root and crowd out wild plants.

Some ground covers are poisonous, and these are marked too where our sources agree. The milky sap of spurges irritates the skin, so wear gloves when planting and thinning. Our sources do not agree on how poisonous periwinkle is: where small children or a dog use the garden, pick another.

A plan for your own garden

Upload a photo of your garden: the planner uses these rules to choose plants for your spot, with numbers, prices and a planting scheme.

Make a garden plan Plant finder

More guides

How to plan a garden, step by step A garden is best planned in six steps: survey the site (light, soil, water, winter), decide what you will use it for, set the framework that still shows in winter, then lay out the border in layers, tall at the back and low at the front. Choose plants so that something flowers from spring to autumn, and finally work out the number of plants and the cost from the planting distances. Our garden planner works by the same rules.

Fast-growing hedges: how much each grows in a year The fastest hedge plant is the Leyland cypress, growing about 90 cm a year, followed by cherry laurel 'Novita', firethorn and western red cedar at about 50 cm a year, then privet at 40 cm. How long a 180 cm hedge takes to screen depends more on the size of plant you buy: several years from small plants, one or two summers from large ones, but at many times the price per metre. The tables use the current shop prices in your country.

Planting a hedge: how many plants per metre, and what it costs Most hedge plants go in at 2-4 plants per metre: Leyland cypress 2, cherry laurel and photinia 2.5 (40 cm apart), yew 3, hornbeam 3.5, privet and beech 4. The plants go in one row, 80 cm from the fence, in autumn or early spring. What the hedge costs depends most on the size of the plants: the table works it out at today's shop prices in your country, for the length of your own hedge.

Building a rock garden: stone, soil and plants step by step A rock garden belongs on a sunny, gentle slope, in lean, free-draining soil: one third garden soil, one third coarse sand, one third crushed stone. Lay the stones, all of one kind, in layers leaning the same way and sunk a third to a half into the ground, so that about two fifths of the surface is stone. Four to six plants per square metre are enough: creeping junipers and grasses make the frame, and between them cushion perennials, stonecrops and thymes flower from March to October.

A perennial border that flowers all summer: plants, layout, numbers A perennial border flowers from spring to autumn when its backbone is long-flowering perennials that bloom from June to September (catmint, woodland sage, coneflower, yarrow, Russian sage, gaura), with bulbs around them for spring and Japanese anemone, sedum and asters for autumn. Plant in groups of 3-7, tall at the back, low at the front; on average you need 5-7 plants per square metre. The calendars show the hardy perennials for a sunny spot that shops in your country sell most widely, with the price per plant.