10 Flower-Forever Versions of Your Favourite Annual Blooms – Plant Once, Enjoy for Years

So many of our favorite backyard blooms that we plant afresh every year have long-lived cousins that survive the winter and return, year after year, with lots more blooms for near-zero effort. If you’re wanting to cut down on the time and cost it takes to keep your garden looking good, swap those flower-once-and-die annuals for long-lived perennial plants that will bring abundant flowers for years to come.

Whether you like to grow lush borders or raise flowers for cutting, there are plenty of perennial versions of popular annual plants to choose from. From sweet peas and sunflowers to candytuft and coreopsis, foxgloves and poppies to baby’s breath and cosmos, there’s a perennial option that brings plenty of blooms for a lot less effort – and we all love flowering plants that practically grow themselves. For a lovely but low-maintenance garden, it's a no-brainer.

Which of these annual plants do you currently grow in your garden, that you could swap out for a perennial version that will flower for years to come?

1. Sweet Pea

If you're wondering what to grow in a low-maintenance garden, start your planting list with a perennial sweet pea. The annual sweet pea (Lathyrus odoratus) is fabulous, granted, but the everlasting sweet pea (Lathyrus latifolius) has lots to offer, too. Pest-resilient and happy to grow in poor soil, it flowers from mid-summer to the first hard frost and returns year after year in zones 5-9.

The only trade-off you’ll have to make is scent, as perennial sweet peas don’t have the wonderful fragrance of annual sweet peas. Everlasting sweet pea varieties range from white to a warm palette of pinks, magenta and red, and for the prettiest result, grow a mix for a standout color show all summer long.

2. Sunflower

Yes, it’s fun to plant sunflower seeds each spring and watch the plants grow sky-high – but it’s also lovely to sit back on the patio and see your perennial Helianthus pop up without any assistance from you! Most sunflowers are annuals (Helianthus annus), completing their life cycle in one season, but there are also a few perennial sunflower varieties that return year in, year out.

If you love the height of annual sunflowers and have the space, then Helianthus maximiliani (Maximilian sunflower) is an excellent choice, growing 6-8 feet tall stems smothered in yellow flowers from midsummer to frost in zones 3-9. Explore the wonderful world of perennial Helianthus salicifolius, too, which brings the same sunny vibes on shorter stems. Autumn Gold Narrow-Leaved Sunflower, available from Plant Addicts, is a favorite, growing just 1-2 feet high with a similarly long blooming season in zones 5-10.

3. Poppy

There are so many beautiful annual poppy varieties that pop up and flower for a few weeks then die, from corn poppies (Papaver rhoeas) to opium poppies (Papaver somniferum). Wonderful as their paper-thin petals are, the flowers can be fragile and fleeting. The perennial oriental poppy Papaver orientale, however, has a lot more punch in the flower power arena.

Because they’re fuelled by a far bigger perennial root system than their annual cousins, oriental poppies are bigger plants with bigger flowers. Papaver orientale flowers last far longer in a vase, too, produce robust seedpods that dry well, and their plump, fuzzy buds are adorable. There are all sorts of varieties to choose from, and Eden Brothers has a lovely oriental poppy selection to begin a journey into this world of flouncy petals and six-inch crepe-paper blooms.

4. Cosmos

Love the carefree flowers of cosmos? If you’re already growing annual Cosmos bipinnatus you’ll know just how many blooms a single plant can put out over the summer months. And there’s a perennial cosmos that's just as enthusiastic.

Cosmos atrosanguineus – the chocolate cosmos – is a dark, sensuous beauty that blooms all summer with rich, deep red petals that last well in a vase as well as borders. It’s hardy in zones 9-11 but as it grows to 30 inches high and is heat- and drought-tolerant, this perennial cosmos thrives in a container so you can easily move it to overwinter in a sheltered spot in cooler zones. As you'll discover, growing chocolate cosmos in a pot is a great move as you can easily place the blooms on a table or plant stand to enjoy their remarkable chocolate fragrance.

5. Foxgloves

The cottage-garden appeal of foxgloves is joyful; the hassle of sowing seed one year and having to wait till the following summer for a fleeting show of these sensational spires is not. The foxglove we most often grow in our gardens is Digitalis purpurea, a biennial that grows leaves in its first year, then flower spikes in its second year before dying. There are perennial foxgloves, however, that return year after year.

Digitalis grandiflora, the large yellow foxglove, lives for around five years and flowers from June to August in zones 3-8. Digitalis parviflora (chocolate foxglove) is a slightly shorter-lived perennial but an incredibly striking plant to add to a modern border or gravel garden. With tightly-packed flower spikes in an unusual rusty brown tone that looks fabulous paired with corten steel, chocolate foxglove seeds are available from Walmart and are suitable for zones 4-9.

6. Black-Eyed Susan

Why grow short-lived annual or biennial Rudbeckia hirta when you can grow long-lived perennial Rudbeckia fulgida and enjoy a reliable display of golden black-eyed Susan flowers for years to come?

There are plenty of varieties to choose from ranging from short-stemmed cultivars perfect for a pot to tall back-of-the-border plants. Perhaps the best of all is Rudbeckia fulgida ‘American Gold Rush’, named Perennial Plant of the Year in 2023 and reliably growing well-behaved mounds smothered with yellow daisies in zones 3-8. The blooms are beloved by pollinators and, as this variety has been bred to be exceptionally disease-resistant, keep on coming to the first frost.

7. Candytuft

You’re no doubt familiar with the annual Iberis umbellata, sown every spring to fill fronts of borders with white, pink or purple flowers through summer – but do you know the perennial candytuft, Iberis sempervirens? It does a similar job of bringing a carpet of flowers – though earlier, typically from March to June, and with white blooms – but also boasts a dense, evergreen mat of needle-like leaves thats act as year-round ground cover.

Because it has woody stems, this is a tough, reliable perennial in zones 3-8, heat- and drought-tolerant once established, and also does well cascading over the front of walls and raised beds.

8. Coreopsis

If you’re a fan of annual Coreopsis tinctoria and its pretty daisy-like flowers with yellow petals and darker centers, take a look at Coreopsis lanceolata. This perennial tickseed is native to North America with long-lasting spring blooms in zones 4-9, and lance-leaf coreopsis seeds are available from Eden Brothers.

Several cultivars have been bred from the wildflower for more dramatic, long-lasting blooms with the same tough nature and appreciation for poor soil, such as Coreopsis lanceolata ‘Sunburst’. Exceptionally heat- and drought-tolerant, it's as happy in a container as it is in the ground, and the flowers are easily dried, too.

9. Baby’s Breath

Annual Gypsophila elegans is such a useful plant in any garden, with clouds of tiny white flowers and gray-green leaves on airy stems. It only lasts a summer, though, so if you want to keep its elegant effervescence in borders, you need to replant every spring. There is, however, a perennial baby’s breath that reliably returns year after year, bringing that wonderful froth of petite blooms for far less effort.

There are various Gypsophila paniculata varieties but one of the most useful is Festival Star. It has fairly short stems, only reaching 18 inches, but they're smothered with tiny white flowers. Blooming from late spring, this sea of bijou blooms acts as the most fabulous coverage for dying bulb foliage, and it continues flowering into early fall in zones 3-9. Festival Star baby's breath has a long tap root so is drought-tolerant, you don’t need to deadhead it, and it spreads to two feet so one plant makes quite an impact.

10. Marigold

If you grow vegetables, you likely grow marigolds to attract beneficial pollinators and act as a sacrificial trap crop to lure aphids away from your precious veggie plants. While the annual French marigold (Tagetes patula) is easy enough to raise from seed every spring, the perennial Tagetes lemmonii works in a different way to benefit your veg patch, for far less effort.

Thanks to a concentration of oils in the foliage which emit a citrussy mint smell, Tagetes lemmonii deters pests and can mask the alluring fragrance of nearby crops. This Mexican bush or mountain marigold is hardy in zones 8-10 but many gardeners outside these zones grow it in pots so it's easilty moved to overwinter in a sheltered spot. As this shrub can grow 3-6 feet tall, growing it in a container also helps to keep the plant small, and the stems are easily pruned into a pleasingly bushy, rounded shape.