Biotic Plant Light Meter

Find out where to put your plant! Take light readings to know what you can grow, or scan the whole room to model how light moves through the year. Easy and informative.

"Bright, indirect light" means nothing until you can measure it.

Plant Light Meter turns your iPhone's camera into a horticultural light meter, so you can find out what a spot really gives, and whether the plant you want will grow there.

MEASURE ANY SPOT Point the camera at the light and get a reading in foot-candles, PPFD, and DLI, the daily light total that decides whether a plant thrives or slowly declines. Readings come from the camera's exposure, the same physics a dedicated meter uses, calibrated per iPhone model.

CHECK A PLANT BEFORE YOU COMMIT Pick a plant and see whether your spot suits it. When it doesn't, the app suggests plants that would do well there instead.

MAP A WHOLE ROOM Scan your room and see daylight modelled across the floor: through your real windows, at your real latitude. No LiDAR? Tap the floor corners instead. Works on any iPhone.

SEE THE WHOLE YEAR A south-facing window in June is a different room in December. The seasonal forecast shows how each spot changes month by month, so you can place a plant for the year rather than for today.

PUT PLANTS ON THE MAP Drop a plant onto any spot and see how it would fare across the seasons — which months carry it, and which fall short.

Readings are estimates from your camera, not laboratory measurements. They're built for comparing one spot against another and matching plants to them, which is the question that actually matters.

Free. No account, no ads.

Made by Biotic Instruments.