Onion · Delhi, Delhi, India
When to plant onions in Delhi
Main outdoor window
9-30 Dec
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
7 January
In Delhi, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
20 Mar - 9 Apr
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Delhi
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
28 Oct - 18 Nov
Ten weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Plant out
9-30 Dec
Four weeks before your last frost.
Harvest
20 Mar - 9 Apr
Onions through the year
Against the frost risk in Delhi
Why these dates
Start seed ten weeks before last frost. Choose long-day cultivars above roughly 38 degrees latitude and short-day types below it - the wrong choice produces no bulb regardless of timing.
Young plants take -8C. Autumn-planted sets overwinter reliably in zone 6 and warmer.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Onions are timed from 10 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 4 weeks before it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Delhi.
Also in Delhi
Other vegetables to time
Growing onions in Delhi
When should I plant onions in Delhi?
Aim for 9-30 Dec in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 10-31 Dec - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will onions be ready to harvest in Delhi?
Expect to start picking around 20 Mar - 9 Apr, based on 100 to 120 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will onions tolerate?
Young plants take -8C. Autumn-planted sets overwinter reliably in zone 6 and warmer.