The app that stopped me from killing every plant I owned

I have killed a succulent. Those are supposed to be nearly impossible to kill. You water them once every couple of weeks, stick them near a window, and they just exist. Mine turned into a small brown puddle within two months. I overwatered it, apparently. That was the plant my coworker gave me specifically because she said I couldn't mess it up.

Before that, a peace lily. Before the peace lily, a fern that I forgot about for three weeks during a work crunch. Before the fern, a basil plant that came from the grocery store and lasted nine days. At some point I stopped buying plants because the guilt of watching them slowly give up was worse than having an empty apartment.

Then a friend showed me her phone and it had a schedule on it that looked like a small child's chore chart. Water the monstera. Mist the calathea. Rotate the fiddle leaf. Fertilize the pothos. She had eleven plants and they were all alive. The app was Planta.

What it actually does

You take a photo of a plant and Planta identifies it. Then you tell it where the plant lives in your home, how much light it gets, what kind of pot it's in. The app builds a care schedule from that and pings you when something needs doing. Water this one today. Fertilize that one next week. Mist this one every three days.

The reminders aren't generic. It factors in something like thirty parameters, including your local weather and the season. A snake plant in Phoenix in July gets a different schedule than the same plant in Seattle in November. You check off tasks as you do them, and the schedule adjusts over time.

There's also a light meter that uses your phone camera to measure how much light a spot actually gets. I had no idea what "bright indirect light" meant before this. The meter just tells you whether a spot works for the plant you're considering, which would have been useful information before I stuck a fern in a dark hallway.

Nine days felt like a long time

I started with one plant. A pothos, because everything I read said they're forgiving. Planta told me to water it every nine days. My instinct was to water it whenever the soil looked dry on top, which is exactly how I drowned the succulent. But I followed the schedule, and the pothos didn't die. It grew. Visibly. Within a month there was a new vine hanging off the shelf.

So I got another one. Then another. I have seven now and the only one that's given me trouble is a calathea, which I've since learned gives everybody trouble. The app has a plant doctor feature where you photograph a sick leaf and get a diagnosis. My calathea had brown tips from low humidity. Moved it to the bathroom. Doing better.

The thing that got me is how much I just didn't know. I thought all plants needed roughly the same amount of water and sunlight. I'd been guessing wrong for years and didn't realize it because the plants just died and I blamed myself for having a black thumb.

The free version vs. premium

Basic watering reminders are free, which is honestly enough if you only have a couple of plants. Premium is about thirty-six dollars a year and unlocks the identification, the doctor feature, the light meter, and detailed care guides.

I paid for premium after my third plant because I wanted the light meter, and I've ended up using the identification tool more than I expected. Half the plants at the hardware store don't have useful labels. Being able to point my phone at something and know what it actually needs before I buy it has saved me from a few regrettable impulse purchases.

The black thumb thing

If you've ever described yourself as someone who kills plants, this is probably your thing. You don't need to learn plant care theory or browse forums to figure out why your leaves are turning yellow. The app just tells you what to do and when to do it.

If you're already good with plants, you don't need it. And if you only have one low maintenance plant on your desk that refuses to die, the free version is fine.

Seven plants are alive on my windowsill right now. I still think about the succulent sometimes. Planta is free on iOS and Android.