Why There’s No Fruit on Your Apple Tree This Year

Is your apple tree missing fruit this year? Join farmer Briana Yablonski to learn a few reasons why your tree may be bare.

Written by Briana Yablonski Horticulture review by Sarah Jay Last updated: October 3, 2025 | 5 min read

Close-up of an apple tree with lush green leaves and only a few tiny unripe fruits just starting to form, giving the look of an apple tree with no fruit.

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Many fruits shine in the spring and summer, but most apples reach their prime in the fall. Adding an apple tree or two to your garden or homestead is a fun way to experiment with new varieties and enjoy these flavorful fruits fresh from the tree.

While apples are susceptible to numerous diseases and pests, one problem is easier to identify: a lack of fruit! If you notice there’s no fruit on your apple tree, it’s time to investigate the cause so you can prevent it in the future.

Environmental problems, improper care, and poor planting can all create a bare tree. I’ll share a handful of common reasons why you’re dealing with an apple tree with no fruit, so you can determine the cause of your problems.

Tree is Too Young

Young apple trees stand in neat rows in a sunny orchard, their slender trunks and leafy branches catching the warm light. — Young trees often need years before rewarding with fruit.

Most apple trees won’t begin bearing fruit until they’re at least three years old. Some dwarf trees may produce a few flowers and fruits in their second year, but don’t expect to pick bushels.

If you planted a tree that’s on a standard rather than dwarfing rootstock, expect to wait even longer until you spot your first apple. Some of these trees won’t produce flowers until they’re in their eighth year of growth, but this is on the upper end of growth.

Since most growers plant grafted saplings rather than seeds, they can expect to see their first fruits in two to five years after planting. Trees planted in the last few years may not produce fruit, so give them a few more growing seasons before worrying.

Early Spring or Late Frost

An apple tree shows blossoms damaged by spring frosts, their once delicate petals now withered, brown, and crispy against the branches. — Late frosts can steal flowers before fruits develop.

While apples are ready to harvest in the late summer or fall, flower production happens in the spring. Like all fruits, apples start as flowers, so no apple blossoms means no crunchy fruits.

Even if your apple tree produces flowers, you may not end up with apples. These blossoms are especially prone to frost damage, so a period of below-freezing temperatures can zap the flowers and remove any chance of future apples.

Many people believe that late frosts are responsible for cold-damaged buds, but early warm days can also contribute to this problem. An extended warm spell in the late winter can signal to trees that it’s time to start producing flower buds. When temperatures return to normal, these buds may die.

Flower buds become more susceptible to cold as they develop. The majority of blooming flowers can withstand 30 minutes at 29°F (-2°C), and most newly developed flower buds can survive 30 minutes at 16°F (-9°C). As temperatures decrease, a greater number of buds and flowers will die.

If your apple trees have formed buds and you receive a freeze, they may still be okay, even if they’re fully blooming. Slicing open a bud/flower will kill the test subject, but it can help you learn if other buds on the tree were damaged by the cold. A brown interior indicates damage and lets us know the bud will not grow into a healthy fruit.

If this is the reason your apple tree has no fruit, there’s not much you can do to protect it from these cold temperatures, but planting apples that bloom at different times may help a bit. It’s also reassuring to know that apple trees can lose more than half their blooms and still form a full crop.

Poor Pollination

A bee gathers nectar from an apple tree flower cluster, with blossoms of five white petals tinged with pale pink and golden-yellow stamens at the center. — Lack of pollinators can prevent flowers from forming fruit.

If your apple blossoms make it through the spring, that doesn’t mean they’ll automatically turn into apples. Proper pollination must occur for fruit formation.

Apples are pollinated by insects, primarily bees, so a lack of these critters is one reason for poor pollination. Avoiding broad-spectrum insecticides and planting a diverse habitat is one way to help support these pollinators.

Even if you have a healthy population of bees buzzing about your apple tree, pollination problems may still occur. That’s because apple trees require cross-pollination. While a few apple cultivars are self-fertile and don’t require another tree, all apple varieties will greatly benefit from another cultivar that can act as a pollinator.

It’s important to select varieties that bloom at the same time. If you select one variety that blooms early in the season and another that blooms in the late season, they won’t be able to pollinate each other. Looking at the bloom time of each variety can help you select compatible varieties.

If you have an apple tree with no fruit and you think it’s because you only have one apple tree, planting another tree will remedy the problem. It will likely take a few years for the second tree to begin flowering, so expect to wait a few more years for proper pollination and fruit set.

Warm Winter

Branches arch under the weight of ripe, round fruits with glossy red skin streaked with yellow-green, hanging among dense clusters of broad, serrated green leaves. — Each variety thrives under its own chill requirements.

When gardeners think of harmful winters, they often imagine abnormally cold temperatures that damage plants. Severe cold can definitely cause harm, but unseasonably warm weather can also lead to an apple tree with no fruit.

Apple trees require a certain number of chill hours before they can break dormancy and begin producing fruit. This cold requirement is one reason it’s difficult to cultivate apple trees in warmer growing zones.

Chill hours refer to the number of hours below 45°F (7°C). Different apple varieties have varying chill requirements, so it pays to look at each cultivar’s needs before planting it in your area. Growers in warmer areas should stick to low chill varieties like ‘Fuji’ and ‘Granny Smith’ and growers in colder areas can feel free to plant high chill varieties like ‘Red Delicious’ and ‘Honeycrisp.’

If you found out you planted a variety that requires a cooler climate than where you live, there’s not much you can do. Planting a cultivar better suited to your growing zone is the best option.

Improper Pruning

A man's hands hold pruning shears while trimming slender branches of a young apple tree, with fresh green leaves clustered along the stems. — Cutting too much reduces flowering and future fruiting.

Pruning too much or at the wrong time of year can lead to few or no fruit on your apple tree. The best time to prune apple trees is late winter or early spring, after extreme cold has passed but before the trees break their dormancy. Pruning too late in the spring increases the chances that you’ll remove maturing flower buds and decrease the tree’s ability to produce fruit.

Another mistake is removing too much growth at once. If your plant doesn’t have enough foliage, it won’t be able to capture the solar energy it needs to produce sugars. This lack of energy forces the tree to focus on growing new leaves rather than producing fruit.

Biennial Bearing

A man's hands use pruning shears to thin out clusters of small, unripe green apples on a tree during early summer. — Thinning fruit clusters prevents branches from breaking unexpectedly.

When apple trees are left unpruned, they sometimes develop a biennial bearing schedule. The trees will produce a large crop one year, depleting much of the tree’s energy reserves and potentially breaking some of the branches. As a consequence, the trees will produce few or no apples the following year.

Pruning your apple trees can help break this bearing cycle, but thinning excessive fruit is the real trick. Apples produce fruits in clusters, but leaving all of these on the plant will result in small apples and broken branches. Thinning the clusters to a single fruit will allow for larger apples and disrupt the biennial bearing cycle.