Are Vine-Ripened Tomatoes Just Around the Corner?

It's the age-old question: How long do tomatoes take to ripen? (Or is it "How many licks to the center of a Tootsie Pop?") The answer is... longer than you'd expect.

Your plants have formed a mini jungle in your garden, their limbs are heavy with clusters of green fruit, but you still don't have red tomatoes. You've been waiting and waiting.

Let's look at just how long it takes for that fruit to ripen. Then, I'll tell you ways to encourage your tomato plants to speed up the ripening process.

Tomato Plants Take a Long Time to Mature

Okay, the first thing to understand about your tomatoes is that they are members of what I call the long and lengthy club, which means they need 65 to 90 days to produce. That’s because we’re growing tomatoes not for the leaves (definitely don’t want to eat those!), but for the fruit. And fruit is one of the last steps in the plant's life cycle. 

If you want to start growing tomatoes, I recommend going to your local nursery and buying a little plant. The tag should tell you how many days it’ll take for the plant to start fruiting. But just know that when you put tomatoes in the ground, you've got at least two months ahead of you before your first harvest. 

Period. 

The Type of Plant You're Growing Will Determine When You Get Ripe Tomatoes

The second thing to understand about your tomatoes is that there are actually two different types of plants: determinate and indeterminate. Determinate plants fruit and finish all at once. You'll have one large harvest after you've patiently waited on the fruit.

Indeterminate, or vining, plants, which is what I grow up my arch trellises, fruit and finish a little bit at a time. What that means is I’ll start to get fruit really early on the plant, and then maybe two months after that, I'll get fruit up at the top of my arch. Watch my video on how to grow tomatoes up an arch trellis for more details on the two different types.

I prefer indeterminate plants because I love a kitchen garden that always has something new and exciting and different going on. Plus, you can enjoy some of the fruits while you're waiting on others to ripen. 

Tomato Ripening Stages

Once a tomato fruit forms, it will go through several stages in the ripening process. You can technically pick the fruit at any one of these stages, and there are advantages and disadvantages to harvesting at each stage.

Stage One: Mature Green Tomatoes

When tomato fruits are green, their seeds are fully developed inside, but their delicious flavor is still developing. Some commercial growers will harvest fruits while they're still green so that they can ripen during their long commute to the grocery store (and this is why the stuff you grow at home just tastes so much better).

Unless you need your tomatoes to travel a long way, too, it's best to not pick tomatoes while they're still green. The exception would be if you're expecting frost. If that were the case, go ahead and harvest all the fruits from the plant and bring them inside to ripen.

Stage Two: Blushing Tomatoes

Tomatoes blush when they begin to show yellow or light pink along their flesh. The fruits are now producing ethylene gas, which is what encourages them to ripen and develop flavor.

If you pick your tomatoes at this stage, they would only need a week or two to ripen inside before you can enjoy them.

It might be a good idea to pick tomatoes at this stage if squirrels or other critters are stealing your fruits. The other advantage of picking them now is that by doing so, you tell the plant to produce new fruits instead of spending all of its energy ripening older fruits.

Stage Three: Vine-Ripened Tomatoes

The flesh of the tomatoes is now 90 percent covered in the mature color (red, yellow, or dark purple). To me, this is when the fruits are at their peak flavor and texture (not too soft and not too firm). You can eat the fruits straight off the vine—no need to take them inside to give them more time.

Total Time to Vine-Ripened Tomatoes

All right, so let's talk about how long it’s actually going to take for these little girls to ripen now that they've formed on the vine. The general rule is that tomatoes take as long to ripen as they did to form in the first place.

I’m always encouraging gardeners to take lots of pictures in their gardens, so you could get scientific and take a picture a day of your plants as soon as a flower starts to form. However many days it takes for the flower to turn into a green fruit, that is how many days it's going to take for this fruit to completely ripen.

I’ve found most flowers turn into full-size fruit in 15 to 20 days, which means those little tomatoes are going to take another 15 to 20 days before they ripen. And that's given the optimal conditions for ripening. 

If you’re feeling impatient, just remind yourself that vine-ripened tomatoes are one of the best things in the garden—definitely something worth waiting for!

Tomatoes Ripening Slowly?

It is possible to tell your plants to move a little faster between the mature green stage and vine-ripened stage. Here are four things you can do to speed up tomato ripening time: 

One: prune tomato leaves

Pruning regularly tells your plant to put its energy into ripening the tomatoes rather than in growing more leaves.

Two: add phosphorus-rich fertilizer to your tomato plants

Use organic and fertilize sparingly, maybe once a week at most. The phosphorus will help with the fruiting process. 

Three: cap the vine at the top

This is for when you’re nearing the end of the season and need your tomatoes to just hurry up already. Cut the very top off the vine to tell the plant to stop putting any more energy into growing bigger and to put all of its energy into finishing the fruiting process. 

Can You Ripen Tomatoes off the Vine?

Mature tomatoes continue to ripen once they're harvested, so you can always cut your tomatoes and bring them indoors. This works best for fruit that’s already starting to blush. Let the tomatoes rest in a windowsill or inside a brown paper bag.

This is your best option if you're desperate because frost is coming or if squirrels are stealing all of your harvest, but I prefer the flavor when fruits are kept on the vine as long as possible.

The Wait Will Be Worth It When Your Tomatoes Ripen Fully

I hope this helps you up your tomato-gardening game. If you’ve got green and yellow fruit hanging out on your trellis, just enjoy the building anticipation of popping a perfectly ripe, vine-ripened tomato into your mouth. It’ll happen… at some point!