State of US seed libraries, 2026.

How we counted.

We started from the Seed Library Network's public census, the map most seed libraries register on, and left out entries hosted in private homes. We added state library lists, regional seed-library networks, college and Extension pages, and news reports. Then we swept about 8,600 public library and city and county government websites, drawn from the federal Public Libraries Survey, OpenStreetMap and the federal .gov domain registry, looking for seed-library pages. That sweep turned up 404 verified seed libraries that were on none of the lists.

A listing counts as verified only when we read a live page, usually the library's own, showing a seed library in operation, including ones paused for the off-season. We read each page for the details a borrower needs: season, limits, card, returns, donations. Addresses come from the Institute of Museum and Library Services' Public Libraries Survey, fiscal year 2024.

Where they are.

California and Illinois lead in raw numbers. Per person, northern New England leads: Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. The Deep South and the Mountain West have the fewest. The table lists every state with at least one verified seed library, with seed libraries per 100,000 people and the share of the state's counties that have one.

Who hosts them.

How they lend.

Each figure below counts only the seed libraries whose own page says one way or the other.

490 state a limit on how much you can take, and 319 a season. 14 focus mainly on native plants.

The returns figure matters. The model state seed law says a seed library may not expect seed back, and the seed libraries themselves have converged on the same answer: invite it, never require it.

When they opened.

Only seed libraries that report an opening year are counted, and ones that opened and closed are not, so early years are understated. The 2026 figure is a partial year.

Where there are none.

Seed libraries cluster in cities and suburbs. Only 471 of the 3,222 counties and county equivalents in the United States have a verified seed library, but those counties are home to about 51 percent of Americans. The other half of the country, most of it rural, has none nearby. Every county has somewhere a seed library could go: nearly every one has a public library, an Extension office, or both.

Tennessee.

Tennessee has 40 verified seed libraries, among the most of any state, but they sit in only 15 of its 95 counties, anchored by Nashville Public Library's seed exchange at 20 locations and by Memphis, Knoxville, Chattanooga and the Tri-Cities.

Counties with at least one: Shelby, Davidson, Knox, Hamilton, Rutherford, Montgomery, Sumner, Sullivan, Blount, Bradley, Anderson, Franklin, Giles, Johnson, Unicoi. The full list is on the Tennessee page.

What we could not measure.

• Seed libraries with no web presence. Plenty of small ones announce themselves only on a bulletin board or a social media page. We list those we could verify; the real total is higher.
• Sites that block automated checks. About 70 listed seed libraries sit behind websites that refuse automated readers; they may well be running.
• How much seed comes back. Few seed libraries publish return figures. The best published evidence, a 2018 study of US seed librarians, found 30 to 40 percent at the libraries that tracked it.
• Whether seed libraries change what people grow. No study we found measures it. That is the next question worth answering.