I tried the Auk Mini – I don’t think I’ll ever kill my plants again

Despite my frequent attempts to look after my indoor and outdoor plants, I always seem to kill them eventually. Whether it’s from over or underwatering, or not tending to them properly during freak summer heatwaves, my houseplants always look a little worse for wear, so I was excited to get my hands on the Auk Mini.

Dubbed the ‘Scandinavian indoor smart garden’, the Auk Mini can grow fresh herbs all year round. It’s a quick and easy way to get into growing your own plants and its low maintenance design and growing system takes the stress out of keeping your plants alive.

I spent the past few weeks watching the Auk Mini in action, and it’s currently the favourite thing I have in my kitchen.

Auk Mini review: price and availability

The Auk Mini is priced at £219 / $259 and is available to buy at Auk. It’s available in black or white, and with a choice of oak or walnut materials, and comes with a 100 day guarantee.

While the Auk Mini comes with basil and parsley seeds, there are plenty of herb and vegetable options to choose from which you can buy separately with prices starting from £5. This includes thyme, oregano, mint, chives, rosemary, lettuce, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes and more.

Auk Mini review: unboxing and set-up

The Auk Mini arrived with the main Auk Mini body, two nutrient bottles, coco fibre, and basil and parsley seeds. Using the instructions manual, it took me 5-10 minutes to set up the Auk Mini in its entirety.

First, I threaded the cable through the main body and plugged it into an outlet. I added the light and poles to the Auk Mini and fixed the cable to the light. Next, I filled the pots with coco fibre almost to the top before planting basil seeds in two pots and parsley seeds in the other two.

Once I’d planted my seeds, I filled the water reservoir with three litres of water and added six sprays of the grow nutrient solution and three sprays of the flavour nutrient solution directly to the water. Then, I simply turned on the light and waited for the Auk Mini to do its thing.

Auk Mini review: design and features

Measuring just 45cm x 21cm x 35cm, the Auk Mini is a nicely sized device that takes up minimal space in your kitchen. Its three-litre water tank is surprisingly spacious and tucked away beneath the pots so everything is nicely condensed in one place. It also weighs just 2kg so it’s easy to lift and move around when you need to.

The design of the Auk Mini is simple and minimalistic, and its white / black and wood colourway can fit almost any kitchen aesthetic. The custom LED light that sits above the Auk Mini pots can be moved up and down as the plants grow, and it has three different colour spectrums that has a power output of 24 watts.

The light for the Auk Mini is customisable and easy to control via the small button that sits underneath the light bar. One tap turns the light on and off, tapping it twice will switch to a bloom light which is best for tomatoes and chills, and holding the button down sets it to a light cycle. The daily cycle mimics the sun, so it stays on for 16 hours and goes off for eight hours.

The Auk Mini can grow herbs and vegetables all year round, but once you start using it, it’ll take 4-6 weeks to grow, or 8-12 weeks if you’re growing tomatoes and chill.

Auk Mini review: performance

As I’ve mentioned above, I’m not the best at keeping my indoor plants alive. I’ve managed to keep two houseplants thriving, but herbs have always eluded me as I have no idea how to look after them. So, the Auk Mini was a blessing in disguise, especially as I buy basil on a regular basis – apparently it was the ingredient I bought the most in 2024, according to my Tesco Clubcard Unpacked!

The Auk Mini was extremely easy to set-up and it was off and away in a few minutes time. The basil seeds were the first to start growing, quickly followed by the parsley, and before I knew it, I had tons of herbs overflowing in my kitchen. I was surprised by how quickly it took for everything to grow, and how slow it was for the water to run out.

Speaking of water, the water reservoir has a water level indicator that shows when it’s running low. However, you can keep refilling the water as much or as little as you like over time, as the Auk Mini will only use what it needs, unlike when you directly over or underwater a plant.

One concern I had when trying the Auk Mini was its electricity consumption. Having the LED light on for 16 hours a day made me worry that my energy bill would go up but I didn’t notice any major differences or surges on my smart meter. Due to its LED light system, the Auk Mini uses very minimal electricity so it was fairly sustainable. I also liked using the LED light as a night lamp in the evenings instead of my main ones so it actually helped my electricity consumption in more ways than one.

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Auk Mini review: verdict

As someone who always kills plants – especially herbs – I was really impressed with the Auk Mini. It fit nicely in my kitchen and simply put, it did its thing in the background with very little intervention from me. I loved watching it grow and was surprised by how quickly it did so, all without racking up my energy bills.

I couldn’t find much to fault with the Auk Mini, other than its cost. While the Auk Mini is a fairly unique product – there aren’t many products like it on the market – at £219 / $259, it’s not cheap by any means.

While there are lots of herb options for the Auk Mini, it only comes with four pots so it’s slightly limited in what you can plant in it. I’m happy with my basil and parsley, but if I want to branch out into other vegetables, I think I’d have to buy another Auk Mini to do so. There’s also the recurring cost of the nutrient solutions too, so the price could add up over time.

Auk Mini review: alternatives to consider

As mentioned, the Auk Mini is quite a unique product but there are a couple other options on the market that you can also try. The LG Tiiun is a plant growing machine that grows plants and herbs in any environment. It can also connect to the LG ThinQ app that sends you alerts on when to refill its water and when to harvest your herbs.

Click & Grow is another Auk Mini alternative that has a similar design and a cheaper price tag. It has more options than Auk, including an indoor vertical wall tower so you can build an indoor herb garden and grow lots of different plants.