Quick Summary: We surveyed 440 home growers between July 23 and August 8, 2026 - the first BudTrainer State of Home Growing. The headline number: the median US grower produces cannabis for about $0.75 a gram ($21 an ounce, $336 a pound), against a median store price of $8 to $10 a gram. The median grower spent $250 to $499 on their garden in the last 12 months and harvested 0.8 to 2.0 lb (13 to 32 oz) of dried flower - priced at their own local dispensary rates, that put the median US grower roughly $5,300 ahead for the year. Their #1 first-grow mistake, in their own words: wrong watering, with overwatering beating underwatering about 3 to 1. And when asked to rank why they grow, the top answer was not money. It was "I just enjoy growing it."
Home growers argue about everything: wet trim or dry trim, soil or salts, whether a $2,000 setup beats a $200 one. What the arguments usually lack is data. So this summer we asked the growers themselves - 440 of them, most with several harvests behind them - what they spend, what they pull, what they wish they had known on grow one, and why they keep doing it.
This page is the full public report. Every number below comes from the survey dataset described in the methodology note, and journalists are welcome to cite any figure with attribution. If you are new to growing, the companion guide is how to grow cannabis at home.
Key Findings at a Glance
- Home-grown costs about $0.75 a gram to produce - $21 an ounce, $336 a pound. The store charges $8 to $10 a gram (about $225 to $280 an ounce). Behind that number: the median US grower harvested about $5,700 worth of flower at their own local prices against a $250 to $499 spend, coming out roughly $5,300 ahead.
- The first grow usually works. Of 396 growers who finished a first grow, 58% rated the crop good or better - but 38% called it medium or low quality. Almost nobody lost it outright.
- Wrong watering is the #1 first-grow mistake - named in 22.5% of open-text answers, with overwatering beating underwatering about 3 to 1. Nutrients and pH come second.
- Money is not the main reason people grow. Among growers who ranked their reasons cleanly, "I just enjoy growing it" came first (35% ranked it #1); saving money came second.
- Home growing has momentum: 36% grew more in the last 12 months than before, versus 16% who grew less.
Who Took the Survey
This is a survey of committed home growers, and we report it as exactly that. Respondents came from BudTrainer’s email list and from home-grower communities and forums through our data partner - people who read grow guides and hang out where growing is discussed. It is a convenience sample of engaged growers, not a general-population poll, and the numbers below describe this group, not every person who has ever germinated a seed.
82% have finished three or more grows and 42% have finished more than ten. 83% grow in the United States and 11% in Canada. 87% are men. A little over half (55%) grow indoor only, 26% grow both indoor and outdoor, and 17% grow outdoors only. Soil is the dominant medium (56%), followed by Pro-Mix (16%) and coco (15%); only 3% run hydro. Most keep it small: 65% usually run five plants or fewer at once.
The Economics: What Growing Actually Costs and Returns
We asked three simple questions: what did you spend on growing in the last 12 months, how much dried flower did you harvest, and what does cannabis cost per gram where you live. From those three answers we computed the value of each grower’s own harvest at their own local price - no averages of averages, no cherry-picked market rates.
The median grower spent $250 to $499 for the year - nutrients, electricity, seeds, and replaced gear - and harvested 0.8 to 2.0 lb (13 to 32 oz) of dried flower. The distribution is wide and honest: about a third of growers (33%) pulled two pounds or more, and 63% harvested at least a pound. At the other end, 17% harvested under 5 oz for the year.
Among growers who buy from dispensaries or know their local prices, the median price sits in the $8 to $10 per gram range - about $225 to $280 for a full ounce. Value each grower’s harvest at their own local price, subtract what they spent, and the median US grower came out about $5,300 ahead over 12 months. The middle half of US growers landed between roughly $1,500 and $11,500 of net value. In total, 91% harvested more value than they spent. Growing your own is not just cheaper than buying - for the median grower in this sample it replaces thousands of dollars of dispensary spending a year.
What a gram of home-grown actually costs
Run the same per-respondent math as cost instead of savings - each grower’s 12-month spend divided by their 12-month harvest - and the median US grower produces cannabis for about $0.75 per gram - $21 an ounce, $336 a pound. 56% produce for under $1 a gram. Against the median local store price of $8 to $10 per gram, home-grown costs roughly one-twelfth of store-bought. Even a grower in the most expensive quartile, producing at $2.50 a gram, is paying about a quarter of the cheapest store prices reported.
The First Grow, Looking Back
Every grower in this survey was once staring at their first seedling. We asked them to be honest about how that first crop turned out.
The reassuring news for anyone about to start: 58% rated their first crop good or better, and 18% say it was better than anything they had ever bought. The humbling news: 38% called it medium or low quality. Growing works on the first try far more often than it fails - but the first crop is usually not the best crop. (We deliberately do not publish a “failure rate” from this question: people who gave up on growing are unlikely to be answering grower surveys, so the 3.5% who told us their first grow died or was abandoned is a floor, not an estimate.)
The first grow is also cheaper than most people assume: 43% spent under $250 all-in on their first setup - seeds, gear, everything - and only 5% spent $2,000 or more. The stereotype of the four-figure starter tent is the exception, not the rule.
The #1 first-grow mistake, in their own words
We asked the question open-text - “looking back, what was your biggest first-grow mistake?” - and themed 387 substantive answers.
Wrong watering tops the list, and the direction is lopsided: explicit overwatering mentions outnumber underwatering about 3 to 1. New growers kill with kindness. Nutrients are second and the story is the same - “overfed” appears constantly, “underfed” rarely. The rest of the list is the standard first-grow curriculum: dialing in heat and humidity, doing the research before germination instead of after, tents that were too small for the plant count, and lights that were too weak or too close.
Why People Grow
We asked growers to rank eight reasons for growing their own, most important first. Ranking questions get abused in online surveys - plenty of respondents marked several reasons “#1” - so for this question we only count the 74 respondents who used each rank properly, and we say so. The pattern is consistent in every way we cut it.
Enjoyment beats economics. More than a third of clean rankings put “I just enjoy growing it” first - more than twice the share of any other reason. Saving money comes second, tied with medical reasons. The same order holds among the stricter subset who used every rank exactly once. For a hobby that pays its practitioners thousands of dollars a year, the practitioners are remarkably clear that the money is a bonus, not the point.
Momentum: Growing More, Not Less
Among these growers, home growing is expanding: 36% grew more in the last 12 months than they did before, more than double the 16% who grew less, and another 10% only started growing within the year. We will re-ask this question, and the spend and reasons questions, in the same form every year - that is the point of calling this the State of Home Growing.
Methodology
Online survey run in Google Forms from July 23 to August 8, 2026. 445 responses were collected; 440 were usable after removing one internal test response and four duplicate submissions (where the same person answered twice, we kept their first submission). Respondents were recruited from BudTrainer’s email newsletter and from home-grower communities and forums shared through our data partner, Seed Supreme. This is a convenience sample of experienced, engaged home growers - 82% have finished three or more grows - and results describe this population, not all cannabis consumers or all first-time growers.
Money questions were answered in local currency; headline dollar figures use the US subset (n=366) only. Savings are computed per respondent: the midpoint of their harvest bucket (in grams) times the midpoint of their local price-per-gram bucket, minus the midpoint of their spend bucket, with the median then taken across respondents. The 36% who answered “I don’t buy it, or I’m not sure” on local price were assigned the sample median ($9/g). Because inputs are bucket midpoints, headline dollar figures are rounded and should be read as estimates. For the ranking question, only respondents who used rank #1 exactly once (n=74) are counted in ranking results; the top two reasons are unchanged in the stricter subset that used every rank exactly once (n=43). We do not publish a first-grow failure rate, because growers who quit are underrepresented in any grower-community sample. Percentages may not sum to 100 due to rounding.
Data partner: Seed Supreme. Survey responses were gathered with the help of Seed Supreme and the home-grower communities they reach. Thank you to every grower who took the five minutes.
FAQ
How much does it cost to grow weed at home per year?
In the State of Home Growing 2026 survey of 440 home growers, the median grower spent $250 to $499 over 12 months on nutrients, electricity, seeds, and replaced gear. A third of growers spent under $250, and 22% spent $1,000 or more.
How much cannabis does a home grower harvest in a year?
The median grower in the survey harvested 0.8 to 2.0 lb (13 to 32 oz) of dried flower in 12 months. 63% harvested at least a pound and 33% harvested two pounds or more, while 17% harvested under 5 oz.
How much money does growing your own cannabis save?
Valuing each US grower’s harvest at their own local dispensary price and subtracting what they spent, the median US grower in the survey came out about $5,300 ahead over 12 months, and 91% harvested more value than they spent. The figure is an estimate built from spend, yield, and local-price answers.
What is the most common first-grow mistake?
Wrong watering - named in 22.5% of 387 open-text answers about the biggest first-grow mistake, with overwatering mentioned about three times as often as underwatering. Nutrient and pH problems came second at 19%, and heat, humidity, and airflow problems third at 15%.
How much does a first grow cost?
Cheaper than the stereotype: 43% of surveyed growers spent under $250 all-in on their first grow, including gear and seeds, and only 5% spent $2,000 or more. The median first-grow spend was in the $250 to $499 range.
Why do people grow their own cannabis?
Enjoyment first, money second. Among survey respondents who ranked eight reasons cleanly, 35% ranked “I just enjoy growing it” #1 - more than twice the share of any other reason - with saving money and medical reasons tied for second.
How much does home-grown cannabis cost per gram?
About $0.75 per gram, which is $21 an ounce or $336 a pound, for the median US grower in the survey - each grower’s yearly spend divided by their yearly harvest, using bucket midpoints. 56% produce for under $1 a gram. The median local store price reported was $8 to $10 per gram, about $225 to $280 an ounce, so home-grown comes out at roughly one-twelfth of the store price.
Is home growing increasing?
Within this survey’s sample of engaged growers, yes: 36% grew more in the last 12 months than before, versus 16% who grew less, and 10% started growing within the last year. The survey will repeat annually with the same questions.
Next Steps
If the numbers convinced you to start (or restart), begin with the guide that walks the whole journey: how to grow cannabis at home. To dodge the top mistakes in this report, learn to read the plant before you feed it with our deficiencies and overwatering guide - and once your plants are stretching, low stress training is where yield is won.
About this data
- BudTrainer (2026). The State of Home Growing 2026 - survey of 440 home growers, fielded July 23 to August 8, 2026. Full methodology above; anonymized aggregate tables available to journalists on request.
About the Author
Henrique Dias is the CEO and co-founder of BudTrainer. He is a mechanical engineer who also holds a graduate certificate in Commercial Cannabis Production from Niagara College in Ontario, Canada - the first college-level cannabis cultivation program in North America. Before founding BudTrainer, Henrique worked with Health Canada licensed cannabis producers, where he gained hands-on experience in cultivation, processing, and post-harvest management of cannabis at commercial scale. He started BudTrainer to bring that same level of craft to home growers through better-designed gardening tools and clear, science-backed education.
DISCLAIMER: Everything taught and sold by BudTrainer® is to be used strictly for legal purposes. We do not endorse the production of illegal substances and it is your duty to ensure that you are complying with the law. The words "hemp," "cannabis," "weed," and "marijuana" are used interchangeably to refer to the same plant (legal hemp with less than 0.3% THC) for the purposes of this lesson.
