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Quince Variety Selector: Which One For Your Garden

Every recommendation below traces back to our full Quince varieties comparison — this page is the fast route to one answer for your specific situation, no clicking through required.

If: Small garden, or don't want a 10-20 year wait

Champion

Champion's mature spread and time to first crop are both the smallest of the six named varieties: the most compact of the six (mature spread 1.5-2.5m) and the fastest to first crop, as little as 5-10 years versus the usual 5-6 years to first crop and 10-20 years to full maturity for the others.

If: Want to eat the fruit fresh, without weeks of storage

Aromatnaya

Uniquely among the six, Aromatnaya's fruit can be eaten straight off the tree rather than needing the usual mellowing period. It shares Serbian Gold's Wisley-trialled leaf-blight tolerance, though it carries no AGM and remains generally susceptible to the standard quince problem list, aphids, brown rot, fireblight, powdery mildew, and codling moth, outside that specific trial result.

If: Want the widely available, traditional benchmark variety

VranjaAGM

Vranja is the AGM variety most UK nurseries stock, and the earliest cropper of the six, though it carries no particular disease-resistance data of its own.

If: Want the most ornamental tree, or the largest fruit

Lusitanica (Portuguese quince)

Lusitanica's young foliage and fruit both carry a distinctive silvery-grey down not seen on the others, and its fruit runs large. It carries no disease resistance in its favour, so the ornamental appeal has to be weighed against watching for leaf blight and the standard problem list without any documented advantage there.

If: Already have a Meech's Prolific tree available locally

Meech's Prolific

Meech's Prolific is a reliable, heavy-cropping variety, but no data sets it apart from Vranja: no AGM, no disease-resistance note, just consistent yield. It's a fair choice if a tree is already available locally, not a reason to pick it over the others.

If: Not sure, just give me the safest all-round choice

Serbian GoldAGM

Serbian Gold holds the Award of Garden Merit, stays compact at a mature 4m x 4m, and is one of two varieties actually trialled against quince leaf blight: a wet-2023-summer trial at RHS Garden Wisley found it showed good tolerance, with smaller lesions and little to no early leaf fall compared with susceptible cultivars in the same trial. It's also said to be resistant to fireblight, and produces good jelly-making fruit ready in early-mid autumn.

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Quince growing guide →Full Quince varieties comparison →