The short answer
There is no national plant limit. Home cultivation is legal in roughly half the states with legal cannabis, and each one sets its own ceiling. The most common caps are 6 plants per household and 12 plants per household, with several states counting per adult instead. A few legal states, including New Jersey and Delaware, allow no home grow at all. Rules move fast, so treat everything here as the landscape as of early 2025 and confirm against your state regulator before you plant.
How the numbers break down
- No home grow: Delaware, New Jersey, Washington (recreational only), Illinois (recreational only). Washington medical patients may cultivate up to 6 plants with authorization.
- 2 to 4 plants: Maryland (2 per household for adults, 4 for medical patients), Virginia (4 per household), Oregon (4 per household for recreational, more for medical patients), Montana (4 mature per adult, 8 per household).
- 6 plants: California (6 per residence), Arizona (6 per adult, 12 per household), Nevada (6 per adult, 12 per household, and only if no retail store sits within 25 miles), New Mexico (6 mature per adult, 12 per household), Connecticut (3 mature and 3 immature per adult, 12 per household), Alaska (6 per adult, no more than 3 flowering), Washington, DC (6 per adult, 12 per household).
- 8 to 12 plants: Massachusetts (6 per adult, 12 per household), Michigan (12 per household), Ohio (6 per adult, 12 per household), New York (3 mature and 3 immature per adult, 12 per household), Minnesota (8 per adult, 4 mature, 16 per household), Maine (3 mature and 12 immature per adult, 12 mature per household), Colorado (6 per adult, 12 per household), Missouri (6 flowering per adult, 12 per household).
- Medical-only grows: Hawaii allows 10 plants per registered patient, and Illinois medical patients may grow 5.
Per person or per household
This is the line people misread. California's six is per residence, so four roommates share six plants, not twenty-four. Michigan's twelve is per household as well. Arizona and Ohio count per adult first and then cap the house. If you live with other adults who each want a garden, find the household sentence in the statute before you buy seeds.
Mature versus immature
Most states count flowering plants separately from seedlings and clones. Vermont allows 2 mature and 4 immature per adult. Maine hands you 12 immature plants and unlimited seedlings but only 3 in flower. The logic is practical: a flowering plant is weeks from harvest and easy to weigh, while a seedling is neither.
Medical Cannabis Plant Limit vs Recreational: Which Gives You More Plants?
Where convenience comes in
Here is what I keep coming back to. Plant limits rarely decide anything for the average consumer. Delivery, curbside pickup, and a dispensary every few blocks made home growing optional. The states with the tightest cultivation rules, New Jersey and Illinois among them, also built the densest retail networks, and that is not a coincidence. Convenience did the work a plant count was supposed to do: it kept most people out of the garden.
The people who still care about limits fall into two camps. Medical patients who need a specific chemovar at a predictable price, and hobbyists who treat it like tomatoes. For both, the limit is a budget line, and most states pair a plant cap with a possession cap on harvested flower, so a big garden is not the same as a big stash.
How to check your own number
- Start with the state cannabis regulator, not a blog. The names vary: Department of Cannabis Control in California, Cannabis Control Commission in Massachusetts, Office of Cannabis Management in New York.
- Check whether medical and recreational cultivation differ. Medical counts are often higher, and some states allow home grow for patients only.
- Confirm the household cap and whether it counts mature plants alone.
- Read local rules. Some cities bar outdoor grows or require fencing and locked storage.
Bottom line
Expect somewhere between zero and 12 plants, expect the number to be per household as often as per person, and expect medical rules to be looser than recreational ones. If you only want to buy flower, none of this matters. If you want to grow it, that number is the first thing to pin down, because it decides how much of your supply convenience still has to cover.