FrostDateCheck

Memphis, TN 38108 Frost Dates

38108, near Memphis, TN: the frost window

Zone 8a

Around 03/16 is the usual last spring frost, about 200 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 11/16, roughly 244 days after the last spring frost.

Memphis sits in USDA Zone 8a (10 to 15°F average annual minimum). The dates above are NOAA's 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting station, a 30-year average, not a forecast.

Stretching the season past the first frost

Memphis's growing season runs out in roughly 11 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.

How much risk comes with planting early here

03/16 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 02/27 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 04/04 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.

Memphis against the rest of the dataset

About 244 days separate Memphis's last and first frost, putting it 8,107 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within TN, it ranks 13 of 770.

Learn more

Two guides worth reading on 38108: the frost range, on how to read the range around Memphis's dates instead of trusting one, and local microclimates, on what one yard in Memphis can differ from the 38108 normal.