How To Transplant Succulents

Succulents are one of the most popular types of indoor plants. These hardy and low-maintenance plants are easier to care for than most plants are and this helped them to become one of the most common household plants across the country.

However, low maintenance doesn’t mean zero maintenance as they still need to be watered and cared for. One of the most important ways to care for a succulent is to transplant and re-pot it when it is needed.

Thankfully, transplanting a succulent doesn’t need to be a complicated affair. In this article, we will explain how to transplant succulents in an easy-to-understand way.

Let’s get started!

How To Transplant Succulents Successfully

We’ll begin by walking you through how to transplant a succulent. These plants are tough and compared to many other plants, are easy to successfully transplant.

1. Get Your Materials

Before you begin to transplant your succulents, it’s best to make sure that you have all of the materials gathered that you will need.

There’s nothing worse than being halfway through a task and realizing you need something else!

Thankfully, there aren’t many materials that are essential for transplanting succulents. The main materials that you will need are a new pot and new soil. 

Make sure that the size of your pot is suitable for your needs. If your succulent has outgrown the old pot then make sure that your new pot is large enough to contain the new growth and some extra.

You shouldn’t go too large with your new pot though, especially if space is at a premium in your home.

When it comes to choosing your soil, we highly recommend that you use brand-new soil.

Old soil may have been stripped of some nutrients and is more likely to be home to diseases and pests. You don’t want to introduce these to your succulent!

Optional materials that you may find useful include gloves, skewers, and a large spoon or shovel.

If you’re handling a succulent that is thorny, such as a cactus, you may want to wear gloves to protect your fingers. Gloves will also stop any dirt from getting under your fingernails! 

Some succulents may take a little time to take root in a new pot and this can leave them prone to falling over in the short term.

This is where your skewers will come in handy as you can prop up the plant while it takes root. Chopsticks also work great for this.

A shovel or large spoon will come in handy when you need to transfer soil from its bag to the pot. It can make the process quicker and reduce the likelihood of spilling any dirt.

2. Remove The Succulent From The Old Pot

Now that we’ve discussed the materials and hopefully gathered what we need, let’s move on to actually transplanting the succulent from the old pot to a new one. 

The first step is to safely remove your succulent from the old pot so that it can be moved to the new one. 

Take a firm hold of your succulent by grasping the stem as close to the soil in the pot as possible. You should make sure that you are holding the stem itself and not just any leaves as this will make it easier to remove.

Shake the succulent lightly by moving it from side to side. This should help loosen some of the soil around it and you’ll find that the plant will soon have room to move and you can pull it out.

If your plant doesn’t have a central stem that you can grasp, then you will need to try a different method.

In this case, use a knife or a trowel to loosen the soil around the edge of the pot. You can then remove the entire plant and soil together.

When you have the plant out of the pot, use your fingers to remove as much dirt as you can. Simply rub the roots gently and you’ll find most of the dirt will fall away.

If the soil is tightly packed and isn’t moving, use a little water to loosen it. You don’t need to get remove event single bit of soil but you should try to remove as much as possible.

Don’t worry if a few smaller roots break while you do this. They will grow back when it is replanted.

3. Transplanting Your Succulent

Take your new pot and fill it with soil so that about one-third of the pot has been filled. You don’t want to put too much soil in as you need to leave room for the succulent and more soil to be added later.

You can cover the drainage hole in the bottom of your pot while you do this to prevent any soil from falling out if you wish, but this isn’t necessary.

Place your succulent in the center of your pot and on top of the soil.

Keep a firm hold of the plant with one hand and use the other to begin filling the rest of the pot with soil until there is around half an inch to an inch spare. You should have enough soil to cover all of the roots but not the stem.

Press the soil down to make sure there is no air and that the plant is in there tightly. If your succulent can’t stand on its own, use a skewer or chopstick to prop it up. You can remove this later once the plant has bedded in.

Give your plant some water as this will help to encourage the roots to grow and anchor the plant in the new pot.

Final Thoughts

In this article, we explained how to transplant succulents successfully. These hardy plants don’t need much maintenance but there may be times when they need to be transplanted into a new pot.

We explained in detail how to do this and why and we hope you found our hints and tips useful.