Indeterminate Tomatoes: A-Z List & How They Grow Best

When I started growing tomatoes, I had no idea that there were two main types of tomatoes: determinate and indeterminate. While it might seem insignificant, you are likely pruning your tomato plants incorrectly if you don’t know which type of tomato you’re growing.

Determinates generally shouldn’t be pruned, while indeterminates do best with a good pruning schedule to keep them growing tall and producing fruit.

Knowing the growth habit of the plants and whether your plants are indeterminate or determinate tomatoes can help you plan your garden properly, and decide when and how to prune your tomato plants.

What kinds of tomatoes are indeterminate? While there is no hard and fast rule, many varieties of beefsteak, cherry, grape, and heirloom tomatoes are indeterminate. Many Roma or plum varieties are determinate.

What Are Indeterminate Tomatoes?

An indeterminate tomato is a tomato variety that produces fruit continuously throughout the season. They grow tall and vigorous, and many indeterminate plants can reach 9 or even 10 feet tall throughout the growing season.

Indeterminate tomato plants are often pruned regularly to help with plant health, airflow, and disease resistance. They grow similar to how a vine would, and without staking or a trellis, they will grow along the ground if you let them.

What Tomatoes Are Indeterminate?

There are a wide variety of indeterminate tomatoes (I have a full list at the end of this article).

Tomato varieties that are indeterminate are cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, beefsteak and heirloom tomatoes. Roma tomatoes are usually determinate, but you can usually find an indeterminate type of each tomato variety.

Some of the best indeterminate tomatoes in my opinion are:

• Paul Robeson (Beefsteak)
• Kellogg’s Breakfast (Heirloom)
• Green Zebra
• Yellow Cherry Tomatoes

I’m always growing new varieties so this list will evolve as I find more and more varieties that taste amazing!

Are Beefsteak Tomatoes Indeterminate?

Beefsteak tomatoes are generally indeterminate. There are some varieties that are determinate, but for the most part, choosing a beefsteak variety will land you with indeterminate plants.

• Big Beef tomatoes are one of the more popular beefsteak tomato varieties. It is highly resistant to many tomato problems like Fusarium wilt, Verticillium wilt, and nematodes. This is an award-winning indeterminate tomato variety that matures around 70 days, which is pretty early for a beefsteak!
• Cherokee Purple is a type of heirloom tomato that tastes incredible! Beefsteak tomatoes generally have a juicy, yet sweet taste and the Cherokee Purple is no different. This variety often produces tomatoes that are 1 pound each, making them perfect for those fresh tomato sandwiches 🙂
• Mortgage Lifter tomatoes have been a popular heirloom, beefsteak tomato for years. The Mortgage Lifter can produce tomatoes that are 1-2 pounds large, that’s a GINORMOUS tomato.

Beefsteak tomatoes are often compared to oxheart tomatoes, which are more heart-shaped but are just as meaty and get to large sizes.

Are Roma Tomatoes Indeterminate?

Roma tomatoes, also called plum tomatoes, are treating canning and making sauce, but they come in many varieties. While there are some varieties of Roma tomatoes that are indeterminate, a lot of them are determinate plants.

• Amish Paste is one example of a Roma tomato that is indeterminate. Their fruit grows to about 8-12 oz each, and since they’re indeterminate the plant will keep giving fruit throughout the season. Amish Paste is a great plum variety that is great for canning tomatoes and making sauce.

Are Cherry Tomatoes Indeterminate?

Most cherry tomatoes are indeterminate, but not all of them are.

Here are some great cherry tomatoes that are indeterminate:

• Super Sweet 100 tomatoes are beautiful red cherry tomatoes that are great for snacking on when you’re in the garden 🙂 They are a sweeter tomato (thus the name) and much more resistant to common tomato diseases than its predecessor, the Sweet 100.
• Sun Gold is one of the more popular cherry tomato varieties, and they add a great pop of color to any garden with their yellow-orange skins. They’re ready to harvest in about 65 days and will continue to produce fruit throughout the growing season since they’re indeterminate.
• Cherry Bomb tomatoes are classic cherry tomatoes, perfect for a snack in the garden or adding to salads and other dishes. They are late blight resistant, and semi-resistant to early blight as well, giving gardeners more piece of mind if those impact your area regularly.

Are San Marzano Tomatoes Indeterminate?

There are quite a few varieties of San Marzano tomatoes. While many have an indeterminate growth habit, there are a few varieties of San Marzano tomatoes that are determinate, so you’ll still want to check to see.

Tomato Suckers – Leave Them or Remove?

When trying to get the largest harvest out of your indeterminate tomatoes, it all comes down to the suckers. No seriously, a tomato sucker is essentially a new branch forming on your plant that will “suck” energy away from others and lead to smaller tomatoes.

Tomato suckers are small leaves and branches that grow where the main branch and side stem of a tomato plant come together.

Make sure you’re not confusing the growth stem for a sucker – you do not want to remove that or your plant will have very little growth from there on out.

Pruning Indeterminate Tomato Plants

With indeterminate varieties, you want to prune off the suckers to get the biggest harvest. Otherwise, you might have a more leafy and pretty-looking plant, but those extra branches won’t produce much fruit and steal energy from the branches that have your tomatoes on them.

In the picture above, you can see two tomato suckers – one that just started growing in, and one that has been on the plant for about 5-7 days.

You will want to prune both off of the plant before they get more established. You can use simple pair of pruning shears, or oftentimes I’ll just break them off with my fingers.

Make sure to check your tomato plants regularly, as suckers can appear and get BIG within just a few days. Make it a habit to get your plants every 2-3 days for suckers, if not more often.

If you’re growing determinate tomatoes, you don’t want to prune off the suckers. Doing this will decrease your harvest yield by quite a bit as you’re essentially pruning off new growth that could lead to tomatoes.

What is a Determinate Tomato Plant?

Determinate tomatoes generally grow to a fixed size and get a little bushier than indeterminate tomato plants, produce fruit all at once in one larger harvest, and then die off. Determinate tomato plants do have suckers, but you don’t need to remove them.

Common Determinate Tomato Varieties

Determinate tomatoes aren’t bad, they’re just different. You might be surprised to find that some of your favorite tomato varieties are determinate. Here are a few popular determinate tomato varieties:

• Celebrity Tomato
• Marglobe
• Rutgers (or Jersey Tomato)

There are also semi-determinate tomatoes, just to complicate things a whole lot more. 🙂

How to Determine if Tomatoes are Determinate or Indeterminate?

It can be hard to look at a tomato plant and determine if it’s determinate or indeterminate – so how can you find this out?

Seed Packets and Online Information

When you buy tomato seeds, you should get some information about the variety of seeds you’re buying. If you’ve already purchased seeds, the tomato packet should tell you whether the

You can usually check the seed packet, or look at the seed manufacturer’s website.

You can also check the list above that has many varieties of tomatoes and whether they are determinate or indeterminate tomato plants.

Once a Plant is in the Ground

Tall vs Bushy

If a plant is already growing and maturing, you can usually tell whether they are determinate or indeterminate tomatoes by seeing if the plant gets bushier, or is growing tall. While both types of tomatoes will grow upward and get taller, indeterminates end up getting really tall, some being 9-10 feet tall! While determinate tomatoes will be around 4-5 feet tall max.

Determinate tomato plants tend to have leaves that are closer together on the stems, making them appear bushier and more full. Indeterminate tomato plants look more like vines and end up growing taller much faster than their counterparts.

Fruit Production

Determinate tomatoes tend to produce fruit earlier than indeterminates. They will also produce more fruit at once since their harvest tends to happen all at once.

Indeterminate tomato plants tend to take longer to produce fruit, and might only produce a few tomatoes at a time.

Do You Need a Trellis or Tomato Cage?

Both varieties of tomatoes do best when staked or trellised in some way. Tomatoes would grow along the ground if you let them, but this can introduce a whole bunch of diseases and tomato pests you don’t want.

Using a trellis (I love the Florida weave style!) will help indeterminate tomatoes get tall and keep producing fruit for you. Using a tomato cage with indeterminate varieties isn’t my favorite method because they just aren’t tall enough to support 7-foot tall plants — which is how tall many indeterminates can get! But for determinates, tomato cages work great!

My personal rule of thumb is to use tomato cages for determinate varieties, and a taller trellis for indeterminates.

Full List of Indeterminate Tomatoes

Below is a long list I created of tomato varieties and cultivars that are indeterminate, and where you can get them. This list gets updated regularly as new cultivars are grown and created. You can search this list in the box on the upper right if you’re looking for a specific variety.

Just seeing a list of varieties is helpful, but it’s hard to get any generalizations out of that. I’m going to break down specific categories of tomatoes and help you understand which ones are more likely to be indeterminate.

Choosing to Plant Indeterminate vs Determinate Tomatoes

Determinate and indeterminate tomatoes both have their advantages and disadvantages, neither one is necessarily “better”. If you’re looking to get all of your tomatoes at once so you can do some canning or make a lot of sauce, then go with determinates. If you’re looking for a plant that produces tomato fruits all season long, then go with an indeterminate plant.

Or plant both, which is what I do! 🙂 Then you get the best of both worlds.