How to Grow Potatoes in Bags and Containers

You do not need a garden to grow potatoes. A single grow bag on a sunny patio, balcony or back step will give you a generous bowl of fresh new potatoes — and it is one of the most satisfying, beginner-friendly crops you can grow in a pot. This guide walks you through every step, from choosing a container to tipping out your harvest.

If you are completely new to spuds, it is worth reading the main guide to growing potatoes alongside this one — it covers the wider picture, while this page focuses on the container method.

Why bags work brilliantly

Potatoes take up a lot of ground in a traditional plot, which puts a lot of beginners off. Grown in a container, they suddenly become one of the easiest crops to manage in a small space.

The first big win is no garden needed. A grow bag the size of a large bucket will happily sit on a patio, a balcony or even a sunny doorstep. As long as the spot gets a good few hours of sun, the potatoes do not much care that they are not in the ground.

The second win is easy harvesting. In open soil you dig blind, forking up the crop and often spearing a few good potatoes by accident. With a bag, you simply tip the whole thing out onto a sheet when the time comes and rummage through the loose compost with your hands. No digging, no damage.

There is also a real flavour reward. Fresh new potatoes, lifted minutes before they go in the pan, taste noticeably sweeter and earthier than anything from a supermarket. That window of just-dug freshness is the whole reason keen gardeners bother — and a container makes it effortless.

Finally, growing in fresh compost each year neatly sidesteps soil-borne problems and the need for crop rotation, because you start with clean material every season.

Choosing a container

You do not need anything fancy. The key requirements are enough depth for the tubers to form, a decent volume of compost, and good drainage.

Fabric grow bags (30–40 litres) are the easiest and most popular choice. They are cheap, fold flat for storage, drain freely through the fabric, and the breathable sides help stop the compost going stagnant. A bag of this size comfortably grows two or three seed potatoes.

Old dustbins, tall pots and builder's buckets all work too, as long as they hold a similar volume — aim for at least 30 litres and a depth of around 40cm. If you reuse a solid container, drill several drainage holes in the base. Potatoes sitting in waterlogged compost will rot.

Purpose-made potato sacks and patio planters are widely sold and often have a handy flap on the side for checking the crop, though you can manage perfectly well without one.

Whatever you use, raise it slightly off the ground on pot feet or a couple of bricks so water can escape. The single most common container failure is poor drainage, so it is worth getting right from the start. For more on pots, sizes and compost generally, see our guide to growing food in containers.

Best varieties for pots

For container growing, first earlies are the stars. They crop quickly — usually ready about 10–12 weeks after planting — and you harvest the whole bag in one go for fresh new potatoes, which suits the tip-it-out method perfectly. You also dodge the worst of potato blight, which tends to strike later in summer.

Three reliable first earlies to look out for:

• 'Charlotte' — technically an early maincrop/second early but grown by many as a new potato, with a lovely waxy texture and excellent flavour. A firm favourite for salads.
• 'Maris Peer' — a dependable second early that produces smooth, even tubers and copes well with a bit of neglect.
• 'Swift' — one of the fastest of all, often ready in under three months. Ideal if you are impatient or want a really early crop.

Second earlies such as 'Kestrel' or 'Nicola' also do well in bags if you fancy a slightly larger potato. Maincrop varieties can be grown in containers, but they need bigger pots, far more watering, and a longer season exposed to blight — so for a first attempt, stick with earlies.

Chitting first

Before planting, it pays to chit your seed potatoes. Chitting simply means encouraging them to sprout short, sturdy shoots before they go into the compost, which gives the crop a head start.

To do it, stand the seed potatoes in an old egg box or a seed tray in a cool, bright, frost-free spot — a windowsill in an unheated room is perfect. Sit them with the end that has the most "eyes" facing up. After a few weeks you will see stubby green-purple shoots, around 1–2cm long. Those are exactly what you want; long, pale, straggly shoots mean it is too warm and dark.

Chitting is most worthwhile for early varieties, which is exactly what you are growing in pots. For the full method and timings, see our guide to chitting seed potatoes.

Planting

Planting in a bag is wonderfully simple. The trick is that you do not fill the container to the top straight away — you start shallow and add compost as the plant grows.

1. Roll the sides of the grow bag down to about a third of its height, so the bag is short to begin with.
2. Add a layer of compost roughly 10–15cm deep.
3. Sit your chitted seed potatoes on top, shoots pointing upwards. In a 30–40 litre bag, plant two or three tubers — no more. Overcrowding is the classic mistake and gives you a heap of marble-sized potatoes instead of a proper crop.
4. Cover them with another 10cm or so of compost and water gently.

That is the whole job. Pop the bag in its sunniest available spot and wait for the first green shoots to push through, usually within a couple of weeks.

Earthing up in stages

This is the one technique that makes container potatoes work. As the shoots grow, you keep adding more compost to bury the lower stems, leaving just the top few centimetres of leaf showing. Repeat this every time the plant puts on 15–20cm of growth, unrolling the bag a little higher each time, until it is full.

There are two reasons to do this. First, it produces a bigger crop: potatoes form along the buried stem, so the more stem you cover, the more tubers you get. Second, it stops light reaching the developing potatoes. Any tuber exposed to light turns green and becomes mildly toxic, so it is important to keep them in the dark.

Two or three rounds of topping up is usually all a bag needs before it is full and the foliage takes over. Our dedicated guide to earthing up potatoes explains the method in more detail if you want to get it just right.

Watering and feeding

If there is one thing that catches people out with container spuds, it is water. Pots and bags dry out far faster than open ground, and potatoes need steady moisture to swell properly.

Check the compost daily once the plants are growing strongly. In warm or breezy weather you may need to water every day, and on hot summer days possibly more than once. Aim to keep the compost evenly moist all the way through — not soggy, but never bone dry. Erratic watering, where the bag dries out and is then drenched, can cause the tubers to crack or grow unevenly.

Watering becomes especially critical once the plants flower, as this is when the tubers are bulking up underground. A bag that runs dry at this stage will give a disappointing crop, however well you have done everything else.

Feeding is straightforward. A good multipurpose compost carries the plants for the first few weeks, but in a busy container the nutrients soon run low. From about six weeks after the shoots appear, give a weekly liquid feed — a high-potash tomato feed is ideal and encourages tuber growth rather than just leaf.

Harvesting

For first earlies, the crop is usually ready 10–12 weeks after planting, often signalled when the plants come into flower. To check, have a gentle feel down the side of the bag, or lift one plant and see whether the potatoes are a usable size — anywhere from a small egg upwards is fine for new potatoes.

When you are ready, the harvest is the best bit. Spread out an old sheet or tarpaulin, tip the whole bag over onto it, and work through the loose compost with your hands. The potatoes lift out clean and undamaged. Pick out every last one, as any left behind can sprout in next year's compost.

New potatoes do not store well, so lift them as you need them and eat within a few days for the best flavour. Spent compost can be tipped onto borders or added to your compost heap rather than reused for another potato crop.

How much should you expect? A well-grown 40-litre bag of first earlies typically yields somewhere around 1–1.5kg of potatoes — a few good meals from a single bag. To plan how many bags to grow for your household, our yield calculator gives you a realistic estimate.

With one or two bags on the go, you can keep a steady supply of fresh new potatoes coming through early summer — no garden, no digging, and barely any space required.