Green Giant arborvitae is the best tall fast growing shrub for most yards. It reaches 30 to 50 feet (9 to 15 meters) and adds 3 to 5 feet (0.9 to 1.5 meters) of new growth every year. Only a handful of plants give you that much height and that much speed at once. Naming them upfront saves you from picking something that stays short or crawls along for a decade before it screens anything. If you want a tall privacy hedge that fills in within a few seasons, you have four or five strong options.
Before you buy, you need to know the difference between two numbers. Mature height is how tall a plant gets when it stops growing. Yearly growth is how much it adds in one season. These are not the same thing, and the gap trips up a lot of buyers. A plant tag that brags about fast growth tells you nothing about the ceiling that growth reaches.
A boxwood is fast in the sense that it puts on tidy new growth, but it tops out around waist height. A bigleaf magnolia grows slow yet ends up huge. So a plant can be quick and short, or tall and lazy. You want both boxes checked: real height and real speed. The shrubs below do that, and they all hold their leaves through winter so your screen never goes bare in the cold months.
Cherry laurel is the broadleaf pick if you want glossy green leaves instead of needles. It pushes past 8 feet (2.4 meters) fast and takes hard pruning well, so you can hold it at the height you want. Wax myrtle is another fast growing evergreen shrub that handles wet soil, salt, and heat better than most. It works well along coastal yards where arborvitae struggles.
Nellie R. Stevens holly rounds out the list with a dense pyramid shape and quick fill. The dark leaves and red berries give you a screen that looks good in winter, not just summer. It shrugs off heat and stays full from the ground up, which is where many tall shrubs go bare and thin over time.
Here is the trap with these plants. The tallest grower is not always the right grower for your space. Leyland cypress can hit 60 to 70 feet (18 to 21 meters), and it will swallow a small back yard or crowd a fence line in a few short years. A plant that big also blocks light and roots into places you do not want.
So check the mature height against your actual space before you buy. Measure the spot, then match the plant to it. For a tight side yard, hold to Green Giant or a holly you can trim. For a long rural property line, the bigger growers make more sense. Space young plants about 5 to 6 feet (1.5 to 1.8 meters) apart so each one has room to fill out without crowding its neighbor. Pick the height first, then pick the shrub that reaches it fast. That order keeps you from regret two years down the road.
Read the full article: Best Fast Growing Hedge Plants Guide
