Companion Planting Chart for Raised Beds
Good neighbors and pairs to keep apart for common raised bed vegetables, herbs and flowers, in one table you can scan.
Companion planting is the habit of placing crops that seem to help each other side by side, and keeping apart pairs that seem to struggle together. Most of it comes from generations of garden experience rather than lab trials, so treat this chart as a set of sensible defaults. Sun, water, soil and spacing matter far more than which plant sits next to which.
In a raised bed, “next to” means touching squares. The raised bed layout planner checks every square against its eight neighbors using the pairs below and flags conflicts as you plant.
Companion planting chart
| Plant | Good neighbors | Keep apart from |
|---|---|---|
| Basil | Pepper, Tomato (staked) | — |
| Beet | Bush bean, Lettuce, Onion (bulb) | Pole bean |
| Broccoli | Dill, Nasturtium, Onion (bulb) | Strawberry, Tomato (staked) |
| Bush bean | Beet, Cucumber (trellised), Eggplant, Potato, Strawberry, Swiss chard | Chives, Fennel, Garlic, Leek, Onion (bulb), Scallion |
| Cabbage | Celery, Dill, Nasturtium, Onion (bulb) | Strawberry, Tomato (staked) |
| Carrot | Chives, Lettuce, Onion (bulb), Pea (trellised), Radish, Scallion, Tomato (staked) | Dill, Fennel |
| Cauliflower | — | Strawberry, Tomato (staked) |
| Celery | Cabbage, Leek | — |
| Chives | Carrot, Lettuce, Tomato (staked) | Bush bean, Pea (trellised), Pole bean |
| Cilantro | — | Fennel |
| Cucumber (trellised) | Bush bean, Dill, Nasturtium, Pea (trellised), Radish, Sweet corn | Potato, Sage |
| Dill | Broccoli, Cabbage, Cucumber (trellised), Kale | Carrot, Fennel, Tomato (staked) |
| Eggplant | Bush bean | Fennel, Potato |
| Fennel | — | Bush bean, Carrot, Cilantro, Dill, Eggplant, Kohlrabi, Pepper, Pole bean, Tomato (staked) |
| Garlic | Tomato (staked) | Bush bean, Pea (trellised), Pole bean |
| Kale | Dill, Nasturtium, Onion (bulb) | Strawberry, Tomato (staked) |
| Kohlrabi | — | Fennel, Tomato (staked) |
| Leek | Celery | Bush bean, Pea (trellised), Pole bean |
| Lettuce | Beet, Carrot, Chives, Radish, Scallion, Strawberry | — |
| Marigold | Potato, Tomato (staked) | — |
| Melon (trellised) | Sweet corn | Potato |
| Nasturtium | Broccoli, Cabbage, Cucumber (trellised), Kale, Winter squash, Zucchini / summer squash | — |
| Onion (bulb) | Beet, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrot, Kale, Pepper | Bush bean, Pea (trellised), Pole bean |
| Parsley | Tomato (staked) | — |
| Pea (trellised) | Carrot, Cucumber (trellised), Radish, Turnip | Chives, Garlic, Leek, Onion (bulb), Scallion |
| Pepper | Basil, Onion (bulb) | Fennel |
| Pole bean | Sweet corn, Winter squash, Zucchini / summer squash | Beet, Chives, Fennel, Garlic, Leek, Onion (bulb), Scallion |
| Potato | Bush bean, Marigold | Cucumber (trellised), Eggplant, Melon (trellised), Tomato (staked), Winter squash, Zucchini / summer squash |
| Radish | Carrot, Cucumber (trellised), Lettuce, Pea (trellised), Spinach | — |
| Sage | — | Cucumber (trellised) |
| Scallion | Carrot, Lettuce | Bush bean, Pea (trellised), Pole bean |
| Spinach | Radish, Strawberry | — |
| Strawberry | Bush bean, Lettuce, Spinach, Thyme | Broccoli, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Kale |
| Sweet corn | Cucumber (trellised), Melon (trellised), Pole bean, Winter squash, Zucchini / summer squash | Tomato (staked) |
| Swiss chard | Bush bean | — |
| Thyme | Strawberry | — |
| Tomato (staked) | Basil, Carrot, Chives, Garlic, Marigold, Parsley | Broccoli, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Dill, Fennel, Kale, Kohlrabi, Potato, Sweet corn |
| Turnip | Pea (trellised) | — |
| Winter squash | Nasturtium, Pole bean, Sweet corn | Potato |
| Zucchini / summer squash | Nasturtium, Pole bean, Sweet corn | Potato |
The patterns behind the chart
- Beans and peas vs. the onion family. Onions, garlic, leeks, scallions and chives are traditionally kept away from beans and peas. If you grow both, put them at opposite ends of the bed.
- Relatives share problems. Tomatoes, potatoes and eggplant are in the same family and share blights; carrots and dill are related too. Separating relatives also makes crop rotation easier.
- Heavy feeders compete. Tomatoes and cabbage-family crops both want a lot from the soil, so they are usually given separate squares or beds.
- Fennel goes alone. Fennel is traditionally grown in its own corner or container.
- Different shapes share well. Deep carrots under shallow lettuce, quick radishes between slow crops, and low herbs under tall tomatoes all use space that would otherwise sit empty.
- Three Sisters. Corn, climbing beans and squash grown together is a long-standing Indigenous planting system: the corn supports the beans and the squash leaves cover the soil.
Using it with square-foot spacing
Lay out the bed by size first, using the square foot spacing chart, then swap squares around to break up any warned pairs. If a conflict is hard to avoid, a single square of a flower or herb between the two crops is a simple buffer. For worked examples, see the 4x8 raised bed layouts, which have no flagged pairs.