Do Pothos Need Drainage Holes?

Drainage holes aren’t strictly necessary for Pothos — but I cannot stress enough how much easier they make everything.

Growing a Pothos in a pot without drainage holes is like growing one in low light: technically possible, but you’re making life significantly harder for yourself for no real reason.

What do drainage holes actually do?

When you water a Pothos in a pot with drainage holes, any excess water that the soil can’t hold runs straight out of the bottom. This does two useful things:

It flushes excess moisture away from the roots. Pothos roots need both water and oxygen. Soil that stays waterlogged for too long suffocates the roots, which leads to root rot — one of the more common ways people accidentally kill an otherwise very resilient plant.

It tells you something useful. Water running out of the drainage holes is a signal that the soil is thoroughly saturated. It takes the guesswork out of whether you’ve watered enough.

Without drainage holes, neither of these things happens. Excess water just sits at the bottom of the pot, invisible (from you, because it’s in a pot; it’s not actually invisible), slowly creating exactly the conditions root rot thrives in.

What goes wrong without drainage holes

The core problem is this: every time you water a pot without drainage holes, you have no idea how much water is already sitting at the bottom from last time.

Water too much and it builds up.

Water too little trying to compensate and the roots near the top go dry.

This is also why the old “add gravel to the bottom for drainage” advice doesn’t work.

The gravel doesn’t absorb the water or drain it away — it just sits there.

The water still collects at the bottom, just above the gravel now.

And because the gravel takes up space that would otherwise be soil, there’s less growing medium in the pot overall. If you water to the point where the water level creeps above the gravel and into the soil, you’ve got a suddenly waterlogged root zone — and no way to know until the damage is already done.

Skip the gravel. It solves nothing (unless you don’t have enough soil – it’s a good pot filler for a too-big pot).

Can you use a pot without drainage holes if you’re careful?

I mean, sure.

If you water very precisely and consistently, measuring exactly how much you add each time, you can manage moisture in a hole-less pot.

BUT WHO CAN BE ARSED?

The one exception I’d make: if your pot is made of glass or another transparent material and you can actually see the water level at the bottom, go ahead.

For everyone else: just use pots with holes.

But I love a pot that has no drainage holes

Same.

Some of the nicest pots don’t have drainage holes, and drilling into a ceramic pot you love is a nerve-wracking experience.

The solution is the cachepot method: grow your Pothos in a plain plastic nursery pot with drainage holes, and sit that inside your beautiful hole-less pot for display. When it’s time to water, lift the nursery pot out, water it over the sink, let it drain completely, then put it back. Your gorgeous pot stays dry, your Pothos gets proper drainage, and nobody has to pick up a drill.

This is how I manage most of my plants. Practical pot for the plant, pretty pot for the shelf. It costs nothing extra and takes about thirty seconds more than watering in situ.

What about self-watering pots — they don’t drain, do they?

This is a fair question. Self-watering pots work on a reservoir system — water sits at the base and the plant draws it up through the soil as it needs it. There’s no drainage in the conventional sense.

The reason this works is that the water in the reservoir never directly contacts the root zone — it’s drawn up gradually by capillary action, at a rate the plant controls. It’s also why good self-watering pots have a water level indicator, so you can see exactly how much water is in the reservoir at any time. The visibility problem that makes hole-less pots risky is solved by the indicator.

That said, self-watering pots can be tricky for beginners for exactly this reason — the mechanics are different from conventional watering and take a bit of getting used to. See Self Watering Pots For Pothos: Are They Worth It? for the full picture.

The short version

Drainage holes aren’t a biological necessity for Pothos — the plant itself doesn’t care where the excess water goes.

But drainage holes make overwatering much harder to do accidentally, and they give you information about what’s happening in the pot. Without them, you’re flying blind every time you water.

If your favourite pot doesn’t have them, use it as a cachepot. If you’re not precious about it, drill one. If it’s glass, carry on.

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Related reading: Best Pots For Pothos: What Actually Works | Self Watering Pots For Pothos: Are They Worth It? | Root Rot In Pothos: Can You Save It?