New Orleans, LA 70129 Frost Dates
New Orleans, LA: when does the frost end?
Around 01/22 is the usual last spring frost, about 147 days away. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 01/05, roughly 348 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 9b (25 to 30°F average annual minimum) comes from the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map; the frost dates above are the 1991-2020 normal at the nearest reporting NOAA station for New Orleans, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
With roughly 19 weeks until New Orleans's first fall frost, a row cover or cold frame is what stretches the last few weeks of harvest here.
Why 01/22 isn't a guarantee
01/22 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 02/23 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 12/28 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
New Orleans against the rest of the dataset
About 348 days separate New Orleans's last and first frost, putting it 2,368 of 40,283 ZIP codes nationally. Within LA, it ranks 6 of 710.
Learn more
Before leaning on 70129's figures: zone vs. frost date explains why Zone 9b and New Orleans's frost date answer different questions, while the frost range explains how to read the range around New Orleans's dates instead of trusting one.