Birmingham, AL 35203 Frost Dates
Frost dates for Birmingham, AL, ZIP 35203
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 03/21, roughly 205 days out. The first fall frost typically arrives around 11/11, about 236 frost-free days later.
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map puts Birmingham in Zone 8a (10 to 15°F average annual minimum); frost dates are NOAA's 1991-2020 station normal, not this year's forecast.
What to do before the first frost
Zone 8a around Birmingham has about 11 weeks left before the first fall frost — that's the usual window to get a cold frame up if you want to keep harvesting past it.
How much risk comes with planting early here
03/21 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Plant by 02/28 and you're betting against frost in roughly 9 years out of 10. 04/08 is the safer bet, historically only a 1-in-10 chance of frost that late.
How Birmingham compares
At roughly 236 frost-free days, Birmingham places 9,216 of 40,283 ZIP codes in this dataset. Within AL, it ranks 349 of 809.
Learn more
zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 8a and Birmingham's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range explains how to read the range around Birmingham's dates instead of trusting one.