Table of Contents
- Best 5 to 6-Foot Evergreen Shrubs for Privacy
- Golden Mop False Cypress (Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Golden Mop')
- Green Mountain Boxwood (Buxus x 'Green Mountain')
- Dwarf Mugo Pine (Pinus mugo var. pumilio)
- P.J.M. Rhododendron (Rhododendron x 'P.J.M.')
- Raspberry Glow Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia 'Raspberry Glow')
- Little Giant Arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis 'Little Giant')
- Emerald Gaiety Wintercreeper (Euonymus fortunei 'Emerald Gaiety')
- Compact Inkberry (Ilex glabra 'Compacta')
- Where to Get the Best Small Evergreen Privacy Shrubs
- Frequently Asked Questions About Small Privacy Shrubs
- Visit PrivacyShrubs.com to Find the Best Small Evergreen Shrubs for You
Privacy shrubs are some of the most commonly sought-after plants in residential landscaping. The right evergreen species in the proper location can provide an immense increase to the solitude of your outdoor space.
However, those seeking evergreen privacy shrubs can encounter a recurring issue. Many of the most popular privacy shrubs quickly grow to significant heights and widths that expand beyond the capacity of many residential growing areas.
If only there were evergreen shrubs that offer plenty of privacy without outgrowing their intended space. The good news is that these plants do exist, even if they seem difficult to find at first. Our list will prove that point by introducing you to the best 5 to 6-foot evergreen shrubs for privacy.
Best 5 to 6-Foot Evergreen Shrubs for Privacy
Here is a list of the best 5-6foot evergreen shrubs you can grow for privacy:
Golden Mop False Cypress (Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Golden Mop')
Murray Cypress
$74.95
$108.99
Murray Cypress: Enjoy Year-Round Beauty and Privacy The Murray Cypress is a fast-growing evergreen that can create year-round seclusion with its dense foliage and sturdy frame. It thrives in various climates and provides a lush, green wall shielding you from… View Product
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Typically 3–5 feet | Provides low-level screening for patios, decks, or seating areas without obstructing broader views. |
| Mature Spread | Approximately 3–4 feet wide | Forms a dense, compact growth habit that limits gaps and enhances privacy at eye-level in confined spaces. |
| Foliage Color | Bright, golden-yellow, threadlike foliage | Offers year-round color and visual interest, making the privacy barrier both functional and aesthetically appealing. |
| Growth Rate | Slow to moderate | Ensures a consistently dense and controlled form that does not require frequent trimming to maintain a neat privacy screen. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–8 | Thrives in a range of climates, allowing long-term, reliable privacy solutions across multiple regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Minimal, occasional light pruning | Keeps maintenance costs and efforts low while preserving a uniform privacy hedge or border. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers well-drained soil, full sun to partial shade | Achieves optimal density and foliage health with standard garden conditions, simplifying site selection for privacy plantings. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally resilient with no major issues | Ensures a durable, long-lasting privacy solution that remains attractive over time and reduces replacement costs. |
Even after finding suitable privacy evergreens, many people complain that these shrubs offer little to no visual appeal beyond consistent greenery. Fortunately, that’s not the case for the golden mop false cypress.
While evergreen, this shrub has a fantastic set of foliage with a distinct golden hue accented with hints of green. However, color alone is not the only feature that makes people love this shrub. The gold mop false cypress also has a unique growth habit, consisting of a loose pyramidal shape and branches that droop slightly.
The parent species of this shrub can reach incredible heights over 100 feet. However, this cultivar reaches just five feet tall when it’s fully mature, making it ideal for adding privacy and intrigue to small spaces.
Green Mountain Boxwood (Buxus x 'Green Mountain')
Winter Gem Boxwood
$72.95
$103.99
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| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Approximately 3–5 feet | Creates a medium-height screen ideal for patios, walkways, and courtyards without dominating the landscape. |
| Mature Spread | Roughly 2–3 feet in width | Develops a naturally upright and pyramidal form, allowing for tidy, space-efficient hedges that maximize privacy in narrower areas. |
| Foliage | Dense, evergreen leaves; rich, medium-green color | Provides year-round coverage, ensuring consistent privacy and aesthetic appeal, even during colder seasons. |
| Growth Rate | Moderate | Offers predictably consistent screening without overwhelming maintenance schedules; easier to shape and control over time. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–9 | Ensures reliable growth across various climates, supporting long-term privacy solutions in multiple regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Moderate; benefits from occasional pruning for shape and density | Allows precise shaping to create uniformly tall and neatly clipped hedges that enhance privacy in formal landscapes. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers well-drained soil and partial to full sun | Maintains dense foliage and healthy growth under typical garden conditions, contributing to a stable privacy barrier. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Relatively hardy, though may need routine check-ups for boxwood blight or leafminer | Generally resilient, minimizing replacement costs and ensuring consistent privacy with proper preventive care. |
Whether you’ve attempted to plant a formal garden or a privacy hedge in the past, boxwood shrubs have likely come up in your plant searches. These shrubs are fantastic for privacy for two main reasons.
First, they have dense foliage that’s difficult to see through. Second, they are easy to shear and shape into nearly any shape you like.
However, many boxwoods tend to grow to considerable sizes, which is why you need to be selective about the type you choose. Among the best options for those who want a shrub that stays small on its own is the green mountain boxwood.
Green mountain boxwoods reach about five feet tall at maturity and have the same lovely broad leaves as other boxwoods with which you may be familiar. Another fantastic benefit of this shrub is that it grows relatively quickly, meaning you won’t need to wait too long for it to reach its full stature.
Dwarf Mugo Pine (Pinus mugo var. pumilio)
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Typically 2–5 feet | Offers a consistent, low-to-medium-height screen that can provide privacy for seating areas, terraces, or along property lines without overwhelming the space. |
| Mature Spread | Approximately 4–8 feet in width | Develops a broad, dense growth habit that naturally fills gaps, forming a continuous privacy barrier at a lower eye level. |
| Foliage | Evergreen needles; rich, dark green year-round | Ensures consistent coverage and privacy throughout all seasons, maintaining a green, protective screen. |
| Growth Rate | Slow growing | Allows for easy maintenance and less frequent pruning while ensuring a stable, long-term screening solution. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 2–7 | Thrives in colder climates, ensuring reliable privacy solutions in a wide range of regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Minimal; occasional light shaping may be desired | Low-maintenance nature keeps landscaping costs and labor demands low, while preserving a neat, natural privacy hedge. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers well-drained soils; thrives in full sun to partial shade | Grows well under typical garden conditions, making site selection straightforward and reliable for privacy planting. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally hardy and resilient | Minimizes the risk of costly replacements, ensuring long-lasting privacy with fewer health-related issues. |
The dwarf mugo pine is a unique privacy shrub that’s sure to provide your garden with an intriguing character. This shrub grows slowly and has an irregular, somewhat sprawling habit that gives off a somewhat rugged appearance.
This needled evergreen shrub is also dense in its branching, meaning that it will do well to block unwanted views from adjacent properties. Meanwhile, the deep green of the needles presents a lovely backdrop for the more colorful plants in your garden.
Along with consistent greenery, dwarf mugo pines also have some interesting ornamental features. For instance, the new growth of this plant takes a candle-like shape that stands upright on the ends of the branches.
Banana Musa Dwarf Cavendish
$49.99
$96.99
Banana Musa Dwarf Cavendish: Grow a Piece of Paradise Imagine transforming your living room into a tranquil island escape. Lush, green banana leaves reaching towards the sun could be your daily view. The Banana Musa isn’t just a plant, it’s… View Product
P.J.M. Rhododendron (Rhododendron x 'P.J.M.')
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Approximately 3–5 feet | Provides a medium-height barrier ideal for screening patios, decks, or lower windows without overwhelming the landscape. |
| Mature Spread | About 3–5 feet in width | Creates a dense, rounded form, helping ensure minimal gaps and a consistent privacy shield at eye-level. |
| Foliage | Evergreen leaves; rich, leathery green, often tinged with a bronze hue in cooler months | Offers year-round coverage, maintaining privacy even in winter while adding seasonal visual interest. |
| Bloom Time & Color | Early spring; lavender-pink flowers | Enhances privacy screening with ornamental value, providing a showy seasonal display that also softens hardscapes. |
| Growth Rate | Moderate | Balances steady coverage with manageable maintenance and pruning requirements. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–8 | Thrives in a wide range of climates, ensuring a reliable, long-term privacy solution across multiple regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Moderate; benefits from occasional pruning and fertilization | Allows for a well-kept hedge without excessive effort, ensuring an attractive and functional privacy barrier. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers well-drained, acidic soil; partial shade to filtered sun | Adapts well to typical garden conditions, making site selection and maintenance simpler for lasting privacy. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally resilient with proper care | Minimizes the need for replacements and ensures continuous privacy with diligent upkeep. |
Rhododendrons are some of the most popular shrubs, whether you’re looking for privacy or not. This popularity is well earned as well since rhododendrons come with broad evergreen leaves and alluring sets of springtime flowers.
As is true with many of the plants on this list, many rhododendron varieties grow to be quite large. However, the variety called the P.J.M. rhododendron contrasts this trend with a mature height of just five feet.
The blooms of this shrub are nothing short of fantastic as well. They have a vibrant lavender shade that covers most of the shrubs in mid-spring. Along with this incredible beauty, P.J.M. rhododendrons are often easy to care for thanks to their tolerance of both hot and cold weather.
Raspberry Glow Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia 'Raspberry Glow')
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Approximately 3–5 feet | Provides a medium-height barrier that effectively screens seating areas, patios, and other low viewpoints without overwhelming the landscape. |
| Mature Spread | Around 3–4 feet in width | Forms a dense, rounded shape that fills gaps and creates a continuous, visually appealing privacy hedge. |
| Foliage | Evergreen leaves; glossy, deep green year-round | Ensures continuous coverage, maintaining a private setting throughout all seasons. |
| Bloom Time & Color | Late spring; clusters of vibrant raspberry-pink, cup-shaped flowers | Offers an ornamental flourish to the privacy planting, elevating it beyond simple screening into a garden focal point. |
| Growth Rate | Moderate | Achieves steady coverage without requiring frequent pruning, making it easier to maintain as a long-term privacy solution. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–9 | Thrives across a broad range of climates, ensuring reliable and lasting privacy screening in diverse regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Moderate; prefers acidic, well-drained soil and some annual pruning | Allows for manageable upkeep to maintain an attractive and healthy hedge without excessive labor. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers partial shade and acidic, well-drained soil | Adaptable to woodland settings and partial-shade conditions, simplifying site selection and ensuring robust growth in suitable environments. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally resilient with proper cultural care | Minimizes the risk of replacements, ensuring a stable, dependable privacy buffer. |
Much like the rhododendron we featured on this list, the raspberry glow mountain laurel is another lovely broad-leaved evergreen shrub cultivar that’s perfect for year-round privacy and seasonal appeal.
This shrub is a miniature version of the mountain laurel that reaches just five feet tall and five feet wide at its largest.
The greatest attraction of mountain laurel shrubs is their blooms that appear in the late spring to early summer months. These flowers have a distinctive hexagonal shape and appear in dense clusters.
The raspberry glow version gets its name from the pink and reddish shades that its petals hold.
At times, the raspberry glow mountain laurel can encounter issues with pests, including scale, borers, and white flies. However, if you’re able to mitigate these issues, you’ll have an incredible small-scale privacy shrub that boasts some of the best flowers in your garden.
Little Giant Arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis 'Little Giant')
Little Giant Arborvitae
$72.95
$105.99
Little Giant Arborvitae: A Dense, Evergreen Globe for Your Landscape The Little Giant Arborvitae is a low-maintenance, year-round shrub that requires minimal attention but offers maximum impact. Growing slowly, it can reach 3-4 feet tall and wide, and its round… View Product
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Approximately 3–4 feet | Provides a low, consistent screen ideal for patios, walkways, and ground-level seating areas without obstructing broader views. |
| Mature Spread | Roughly 3–4 feet in a compact, globe-like form | Creates a dense, uniform shape, ensuring minimal gaps for a continuous, understated privacy border. |
| Foliage | Evergreen, soft, scale-like foliage; rich, medium-green color | Maintains year-round coverage to preserve privacy through all seasons and enhance the visual appeal of the landscape. |
| Growth Rate | Slow, predictable growth | Minimizes maintenance requirements and pruning demands, helping maintain a neat, compact privacy screen over time. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 3–8 | Ensures reliable growth and long-term privacy solutions across a wide range of climates, from cold northern regions to more temperate areas. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Low; occasional light pruning may be desired to maintain shape | Reduces ongoing labor and costs, keeping the privacy hedge looking well-groomed with minimal effort. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil | Adaptable to common garden conditions, making site selection easier and ensuring a healthy, attractive privacy planting. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally resilient with proper care | Minimizes replacement and treatment costs, ensuring a stable, long-lasting privacy solution. |
At this point, the name arborvitae is essentially synonymous with privacy shrubs. Arborvitaes come in several varieties, most of which are among the best options for quickly creating privacy hedges. However, many of these varieties reach large sizes that are difficult to manage.
Thankfully, one of the many arborvitae cultivars, known as the little giant arborvitae, maintains a size that’s remarkably small compared to its relatives. In fact, some little giant arborvitaes will struggle to surpass the five-foot height mark.
Like other arborvitaes, the little giant arborvitae is incredibly easy to care for. It encounters minimal pest and disease issues while forming a neat, rounded shape without the need for extensive pruning.
Emerald Gaiety Wintercreeper (Euonymus fortunei 'Emerald Gaiety')
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Typically 2–4 feet | Provides a lower-level privacy screen suitable for borders, walkways, or patio edges without obstructing sightlines entirely. |
| Mature Spread | Approximately 3–4 feet | Forms a dense, mounded habit that naturally fills in gaps, creating a continuous and visually cohesive privacy barrier. |
| Foliage | Evergreen leaves with distinctive green and white variegation | Maintains year-round coverage and adds decorative appeal, ensuring privacy while contributing to the overall aesthetic of the landscape. |
| Growth Rate | Moderate | Achieves steady coverage without demanding excessive pruning, making it easier to maintain as an effective privacy solution over time. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–8 | Thrives across a range of climates, supporting long-term, reliable privacy solutions in various regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Low to moderate; occasional light pruning to maintain shape and variegation | Keeps ongoing landscaping efforts manageable, ensuring a neat, attractive hedge without high maintenance costs. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers well-drained soil; adaptable to full sun to partial shade | Grows well in common garden conditions, simplifying site selection and ensuring stable privacy coverage in diverse environments. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Relatively resilient with proper cultural care | Reduces the need for frequent replacements, ensuring a dependable, long-lasting privacy screen. |
The emerald gaiety wintercreeper is another example of a plant that dispels the notion that privacy shrubs offer little more than screening and greenery.
You might even find that this small privacy shrub carries some of the most attractive foliage in your entire yard.
Each broad evergreen leaf of the emerald gaiety wintercreeper is mostly deep emerald green with pale white markings that add contrast to the leaf margins.
That color combination, in addition to the glossy surface of the leaves, makes this foliage as attractive as many of the most coveted flowering shrubs you’ll find at your nursery.
It’s well worth noting that the emerald gaiety wintercreeper is reported as an invasive species in parts of the United States, especially the eastern states. Still, if you live in a region where this plant is not recognized as an ecologically harmful invasive, feel free to use it as your small evergreen privacy shrub of choice.
Compact Inkberry (Ilex glabra 'Compacta')
| Feature | Specification | Benefit for Privacy |
|---|---|---|
| Mature Height | Approximately 3–4 feet | Provides a medium-height barrier suitable for screening patios, foundation areas, and property lines without overwhelming the space. |
| Mature Spread | Around 3–4 feet in width | Develops into a dense, rounded shrub that naturally fills gaps, ensuring continuous and even privacy coverage at eye-level. |
| Foliage | Evergreen, glossy dark-green leaves | Maintains year-round coverage, ensuring consistent privacy and adding a rich, lush appearance to the landscape in all seasons. |
| Growth Rate | Moderate | Offers steady coverage without requiring excessive pruning or shaping, simplifying the long-term maintenance of your privacy hedge. |
| Hardiness Zones | Generally hardy in USDA Zones 4–9 | Thrives in a wide range of climates, providing a reliable, enduring privacy solution across multiple regions. |
| Maintenance Requirements | Low; minimal pruning typically needed | Reduces ongoing landscaping costs and effort, allowing for a neat, low-maintenance privacy screen over time. |
| Soil & Sun Requirements | Prefers moist, well-drained, acidic soil; full sun to partial shade | Adaptable to common garden conditions, making it easier to establish and sustain an effective privacy planting. |
| Resistance to Pests & Disease | Generally resilient with proper care | Minimizes replacement costs and ensures a dependable, long-lasting privacy barrier that remains attractive through the years. |
At a mature height of just 6 feet tall, the compact inkberry is another excellent privacy shrub option for those who prefer a smaller plant. This shrub has rounded, oval-shaped leaves that persist throughout the entire year and are dense enough to block sightlines.
This shrub also has ornamental value thanks to its small black berries that cling to the branches through most of the winter season. However, since this shrub species comes in male and female versions, you’ll need both to ensure you get to see these attractive fruits.
In addition to those noteworthy features, the compact inkberry is also admirable for its adaptability to different growing conditions and its relatively low maintenance requirements. As such, if you like small privacy shrubs that don’t require a lot of work on your part, the compact inkberry is the right shrub for you.
Where to Get the Best Small Evergreen Privacy Shrubs
Don’t risk getting your privacy shrubs from a low-quality supplier. Instead, trust PrivacyShrub for all your plant purchases. Whether you’re looking for privacy shrubs or any other type of plant, we’ll gladly ship your preferred species to your home.
Frequently Asked Questions About Small Privacy Shrubs
The total number of evergreen private shrubs that remain small is admittedly limited compared to other plant groups. Since that’s the case, many people don’t have much knowledge about these wonderful plant species. We’ve answered a few of the most important questions about this topic to help you expand your knowledge of small privacy shrubs.
Why is it Difficult to Find Compact Evergreen Privacy Shrubs?
Shrubs that remain small throughout their entire lifespan are difficult to find. The reason for this difficulty is that most plants simply have a mature natural size that is significantly larger than what most people are comfortable maintaining on their own. However, if small shrubs are what you’re after, there are some useful tactics to keep in mind while you shop.
First, focus on dwarf shrub varieties. These plants have undergone specific cultivation that ensures their mature sizes remain moderate to small. However, if you cannot find a dwarf variety you like, the next best option is to choose a plant that responds well to pruning. Strategic shearing and shaping can help keep shrubs smaller than they would naturally grow on their own.
How Can You Use 5 to 6-Foot Shrubs for Privacy?
While shrubs that are 6 feet or shorter are easier to manage, they don’t always give you the same amount of privacy as their larger relatives. As such, you’ll need to be strategic with how you use small shrubs. In some cases, the best way to get the most privacy out of a small shrub is to plant it in a container, which can give it a few feet of additional height.
Additionally, you can try planting your small evergreen shrubs in other elevated spaces, such as above retaining walls or on slopes. In either case, planting a small shrub in an elevated area will allow you to get a few additional feet of privacy without having to care for a significantly large species.
Why Are Evergreens Best for Privacy?
If you want true privacy in your yard, it’s always best to opt for evergreen species. Unlike deciduous plants, evergreens maintain their foliage all year, ensuring that your yard remains private even during the winter months.
Additionally, many people are quick to assume that evergreen species lack ornamental value. However, that’s not the case at all. Instead, evergreens come in a wide range of foliage types, and many of them have fantastic flowers as well.
Are Small Evergreen Shrubs Slow Growing?
Privacy is something that people usually don’t want to wait a long time for. However, it’s important to understand that the growth rate of privacy shrubs can vary greatly. While some small evergreens, like the dwarf mugo pine, grow at a slow to moderate rate, others, like boxwoods, often grow much more quickly.
Take time to learn the growth rates of the plants you choose to grow for privacy. If you find you enjoy a certain plant that happens to grow more slowly than you like, it can be beneficial to select a plant from the nursery that’s already a bit more mature. Naturally, older nursery plants are closer to their mature size, so you won’t need to wait as long for them to provide the privacy you need.
Is Pruning Important for Evergreen Privacy Shrubs?
Pruning is an essential maintenance task no matter what type of plants you grow. With that said, pruning can be especially important for privacy shrubs. Pruning not only keeps your plants healthy, but it can also shape your shrubs into pleasing forms and hedges.
Some evergreen shrubs respond quite well to exterior foliage shearing. This form of pruning involves removing the outermost foliage to shape your shrub into your desired form. When creating hedges, shearing will become an important task that helps your hedge look its best.
How Should You Space Privacy Shrubs?
Spacing is another crucial factor for privacy shrubs, especially when you intend to create a continuous privacy hedge. However, there is no single dimension you can use broadly when spacing shrubs for hedges. Instead, spacing depends entirely on the mature spread of the plants you own.
Research the mature width of your shrubs before you plant them. Based on that dimension, space your shrubs so that their canopies will overlap with one another once they near their mature sizes. Closer spacing allows hedges to fill in more quickly, while wider spacing means you’ll need to wait a bit longer for your hedge to be complete.
Visit PrivacyShrubs.com to Find the Best Small Evergreen Shrubs for You
If you’re ready to increase your property’s privacy without planting species that grow to unmanageable sizes, it’s time to visit PrivacyShrubs.com. At PrivacyShrubs.com, we sell and ship a wide range of plant species and cultivars to all locations throughout the contiguous United States. Visit our site today to find the perfect privacy shrub that will make your landscape more peaceful than ever before.
