Indian Wells, CA 92261 Frost Dates
92261, near Indian Wells, CA: the frost window
Typically, the last spring freeze lands around 12/31, roughly 125 days out. Fall's first freeze usually shows up around 12/27, roughly 365 days after the last spring frost.
Zone 10a (30 to 35°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 Indian Wells, not a forecast for this year.
Stretching the season past the first frost
Indian Wells's growing season runs out in roughly 17 weeks — a cold frame or greenhouse kit is the usual way to keep cool-weather crops going past the first frost.
The actual range around Indian Wells's last frost
12/31 is the middle of 30 years of NOAA records, not a promise. Getting tender plants in by 01/21 carries real risk, frost has hit that late in about 9 of 10 years here. Wait until 12/10 and only about 1 year in 10 sees frost after that.
Indian Wells against the rest of the dataset
Indian Wells's growing season runs about 365 days, ranking 1,891 of 40,283 US ZIP codes measured here, longest to shortest. Within CA, it ranks 875 of 2,555.
Learn more
Two guides worth reading on 92261: zone vs. frost date, on why Zone 10a and Indian Wells's frost date answer different questions, and the frost range, on how to read the range around Indian Wells's dates instead of trusting one.