The Best Privacy Hedges: Shrubs and Trees for Privacy (Pictures)

Screen your yard from prying neighbors, wind, and noise with the help of privacy hedges. Hedge bushes and shrubs offer both aesthetic and privacy benefits to any garden, not just hedge bushes and shrubs.

The best privacy hedges are:

  • Cherry laurel (Prunus laurocerasus)—With huge dark green leaves that are ideal for windbreaks and privacy screens in your yard, this superb flowering evergreen privacy shrub is a winner.
  • American arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis)—For keeping yards private, this conifer is often used as a tree hedge. If you want to make a formed privacy barrier for your yard, this tree has thick, soft foliage and is simple to trim.
  • Box Hedging (Buxus sempervirens)—The majestic evergreen foliage and compact form of this great evergreen hedging shrub. One of the most common shrubs used for privacy screening and living fencing is this hardy privacy shrub.
  • Common Holly bushes (Ilex aquifolium)— Makes a great privacy hedge and is covered in thorns. The spiky evergreen leaves of this defensive hedge deterring intruders and animals.
  • Common privet (Ligustrum vulgare)—One of the most popular shrubs for privacy hedge and ornamental garden plants is a fast-growing semi-evergreen privacy bush.

What Makes a Great Privacy Hedge?

The finest plants for a privacy screen around your yard are evergreen bushes, shrubs, or hedging trees. Fast-growing plants that grow to the height you want should be used in privacy hedges. To keep out noise, wind, and curious looks from nosy neighbors, the ideal privacy hedge should create a natural barrier of dense foliage.

How to Select Plants for Privacy Hedge

For year-round protection against the weather, select evergreen plants. Conifers come in a variety of shapes and sizes, making them suitable for screening. Some cultivars may grow to be quite tall, while others are shorter. Many kinds of flowering evergreen bushes, which are ideal for adding color to your garden, preserve their foliage all year.

How to Maintain a Privacy Hedge

Low-maintenance hedge plants are the best privacy bushes. Only pruning to regulate their height and spread are required for many evergreen trees to grow straight and tall. Easy to shape and prune into natural privacy screens, some of the most popular hedge bushes are easy to shape and prune. The appropriately named boxwood hedge, for example, is a hedge that retains its square form easily.

Popular Shrubs for Privacy Hedges (With Pictures and Names)

For a secluded garden with protection from prying eyes, many types of garden shrubs are ideal for screening. Their year-long leaves and lovely blooms provide lovely borders around your property.

Cherry Laurel (Prunus laurocerasus) — Excellent Privacy Hedge

Cherry Laurel is a robust evergreen shrub that may be used as a living privacy screen and as a fast-growing privacy hedge. This bushy hedge plant maintains its bright green look throughout the year. The fast-growing, dense-growth shrubby plant thrives in full sun or partial shade.

Regular pruning keeps the growth of these bushes in check, despite their height of 15 to 30 feet (4 to 12 meters). To brighten up your yard, you can plant cherry laurel as a flowering privacy screen. In the mid-summer, creamy-white blooms release a fruity fragrance.

Photinia ‘Red Robin’ (Photinia x fraseri ‘Red Robin’)

Grow Photinia ‘Red Robin’ privacy bushes for their lovely red leaves, which are difficult to see through. As a hedge, it may provide enough cover in a garden or be used as a useful living fence. Prune the bushes to create a formal hedge every spring and summer.

Photinia produces bright red leaves in the spring and transitions to dark green over time. White delicate flowers and crimson berries add to the visual appeal of this privacy shrub. You can expect about one foot (30 cm) of growth each year when growing in full sun or partial shade.

Laurustinus (Viburnum tinus) — Flowering Privacy Screen

The Viburnum tinus bush has dense evergreen foliage and is easy to grow. It may be used to create a beautiful flowering privacy living fence. Your garden is visually stunning with its lustrous dark green leathery leaves and dramatic flower clusters. The spreading privacy shrub grows quickly and can reach a height of 8 feet (2.4 meters) with a rounded spread of 6 feet (1.8 meters).

You may make a colorful shrub border hedge by planting Laurustinus bushes as hedges or screens. In the winter, the clusters of flowers bloom, brightening up yards and late in the year. This low-maintenance variety just needs a little trimming to keep growing as a stylish, romantic hedge.

Box Hedging (Buxus sempervirens) — Low-Maintenance Privacy Hedging

Because it’s simple to form and prune into natural privacy screen, box hedging is a popular border shrub in formal gardens. It offers the seclusion and protection you require from a living screen because of its thick, neat growth and soft, lush leaves. Boxwood trees are simple to trim and shape, and they may be trimmed into a box-shaped hedge if desired.

Boxwood privacy hedges range in height from 3 to 30 feet (1 to 9 meters) depending on the cultivar. In most soil types and part shade, you can plant these slow-growing shrubs as hedging. For formal gardens, low formal hedges, or screening in tiny gardens, boxwood is a common hedge plant. Some people plant rose of Sharon plants in a boxwood hedge for additional beauty in their garden. The boxwood provides winter privacy and the hibiscus plant produces stunning summer flowers.

Firethorn (Pyracantha)

With its decorative red berries, firethorn bushes form a beautiful living screen that adds privacy. The thorny spikes on the bushes make for lovely glossy foliage. You may easily cut shrubs into useful hedges with pruning.

Instead, to boost security, these border bushes may be found along fences or walls. The flowers and berries of these blooming privacy bushes are what make them so appealing.

In the spring and summer, clusters of white blooms appear on the prickly hedge foliage, before turning crimson or orange in the autumn and winter. To make sure that unsuitable visitors are kept out, use firethorn bushes as a barrier hedge.

Holly (Ilex) – Security and Privacy Hedge

Holly bushes are a popular low-maintenance plant for living fences. Holly, a prickly evergreen plant with spiky leaves, is another kind of privacy shrub. Several varieties of evergreen holly become thorny bushes when the hedgerow is established, and they need little care once established. These evergreen hedge plants have spiky edges on their leaves, making it difficult for people to enter your yard.

American Holly (Common Holly / English Holly) Ilex aquifolium ‘Alaska’

Alaska holly is a particularly good privacy hedge. Its thick, yet slender growth produces narrow privacy hedges. Because of its prickly leaf borders, this plant makes a great defensive shrub for deterring strangers from entering your property. Another kind of Ilex aquifollium with multicolored dark glossy green leaves with yellow edging that creates a beautiful privacy hedge is the Hedgehog Holly. These holly species are simple to design and provide a brilliant, formal barrier screen that keeps intruders out.

Dragon Lady Holly (Ilex × aquipernyi ‘Meschick’)

The ‘Dragon Lady’ is an evergreen holly bush that has smooth green leaves and a strong spread tendency. This holly species’ upright, symmetrical development makes it ideal for forming a narrow pyramid of privacy hedges. These holly bushes produce a lustrous hedge that stays green all winter, and they are planted side by side. If you want a privacy screen with deep foliage, plant the Meschick cultivar in a sunny spot. In full shade, the leaves relax and become thinner.

Sky Pencil Holly (Ilex crenata ‘Sky Pencil’)

As its name suggests, this holly hedge plant has a slender, skyward growth. Little dark green leaves, which are glossy, make up the foliage of these columnar tree-like plants. Little columnar trees might grow to be up to 10 feet (3 meters) tall. ‘Sky Pencil’ hollies are often used in hedges, privacy screens, and plantings along walls or fences.

One of the reasons why using holly plants for screening is attractive is because they require little maintenance. All you have to do is trim the tops to keep them at the desired height.

False Holly (Osmanthus heterophyllus)

Fast-growing privacy shrubs False Hollies are a good option. False holly leaves have a variegated appearance and resemble holly leaves, while they are related to olive trees. False hollies are one of the best shrubs for privacy due to their dense growth and lush evergreen foliage.

The drought-tolerant shrub may flourish in a variety of situations and is hardy. If you want a fast-growing, blooming privacy screen in your yard, false hollies are ideal. In the fall and winter, the low-maintenance plant bears a profusion of fragrant white blooms.

The colorful Osmanthus heterophyllous ‘Variegatus’ is a fantastic choice for bright hedges, living screens, or border bushes if you’re looking for a privacy screen to brighten a garden.

Japanese Spindle (Euonymus japonicus)

Japanese spindle evergreen shrub has tiny, brilliantly-colored green leaves that create a private hedge. The dense foliage is beautiful. Planting side by side creates cheerful privacy hedges with the versatile garden plant. They’re ideal for concealing your front or rear yards, wherever you want some seclusion.

Several cultivars of Japanese spindle exist, each with variegated or yellow leaves. Hedgerows may grow to be 6.5 feet (2 meters) tall when mature. To keep this hedge plant thriving in your yard, little care is required.

Japanese Pittosporum (Pittosporum tobira)

Variegated cultivars of this hedging plant with oval leaves and white flowers are available for added interest and beauty. The fragrance of the blooming hedge gives it the moniker “mock orange.” This fast-growing privacy bush thrives in most soil types and receives partial shade.

This popular hedge plant may be cut to form a smart, formal hedge that grows to 33 feet (10 meters) tall and broad, or it may be shaped into a hedge. Variegated cultivars are available if you need a bright privacy hedge, and they can add color and interest to your garden. If you want a low-growing border hedge, there are dwarf cultivars to choose from.

Chinese Fringe Flower (Loropetalum chinense)

The Chinese Fringe Flower’s dark purple, almost black dense foliage adds a decorative element to your living fence. The bushy evergreen plant has a neat, compact development habit that keeps its color and leaves throughout the year. Early spring brings beautiful pink blooms to this lovely hedge, adding elegance.

Loropetalum shrubs grow to be around 5 feet (1.5 meters) tall. Just minor pruning is required once the hedging plant has been created, to preserve its attractive, formal form. As a small sized privacy screen or as a living barrier, grow as a hedge along entryways.

Common Privet (Ligustrum vulgare) — Popular Privacy Hedges

If you desire a quick growing privacy hedge, choose the common privet. Living fences are created by its thick, compact development and vivid green tiny leaves, which provide wind, noise, and nosy neighbors with shelter. A hedge can grow quickly due to its quick-growing nature.

Privet shrubs are simple to trim and manage, which makes them ideal for hedgerows. A formal, box-shaped hedge that is up to 10 feet (3 meters) tall may be built. Summer produces delicate white blooms, while winter produces little black fruits. Privet hedges may be evergreen, semi-evergreen, or deciduous depending on the climate and variety.

Evergreen Indian Hawthorn (Rhaphiolepis indica)

In your garden, Indian Hawthorn bushes may grow into a lovely evergreen flowering hedge. An informal hedge along a wall or as a standalone privacy screen is created by the rounded growth of the Indian hawthorn. To grow as a hedge, the hedging hawthorn plant requires little care.

The bushy hedge produces beautifully scented, white blooms every spring. Animals and intruders will be deterred by the thick foliage, as well as nosy neighbors from seeing inside. Even in the winter, when other deciduous plants have lost their leaves, this evergreen hedge offers plenty of privacy.

New Zealand broadleaf (Griselinia littoralis)

Griselinia littoralis is a tough, low-maintenance evergreen fast growing privacy shrub native to New Zealand. The hedge bush has fast growth, low-maintenance requirements, and thick, dense foliage that lasts throughout the year. Strong winds cannot penetrate the woody stems, which provide additional security.

The resistance of the Griselinia littoralis to salt is very high. As a result, it makes a fantastic option for coastal regions where you want to establish privacy hedges or as a windbreak against strong sea breezes.

Anglo-Japanese Yew (Taxus x media ‘Hicksii’)

This yew cultivar is a compact shrub with brilliant dark green needle leaves that may be pruned to create a formal hedge. Over 5″ (12 cm) per year, the slow-growing shrub grows. This evergreen, on the other hand, may be cut into a lovely formal hedge that grows up to 20 feet (6 meters) tall.

Popular Trees for Privacy Hedge (With Pictures and Names)

As a living privacy screen, many varieties of evergreen trees are also acceptable. The foliage of many conifers is delicate and feathery, with upright growth. Let’s explore several types of trees that may provide you with a lot of privacy in your yard.

American Arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis)

Many cultivars of arborvitae (Thuja) trees are available for use as privacy screens and hedges. Conifers are ideal for hedgerows because of their upright, columnar growth and ease of upkeep. Thuja trees, too, grow quickly. As a result, you may build a few feet of privacy in no time at all. Excellent for lengthy, complete hedgerows are a few arborvitae (Thuja) species:

  • Thuja occidentalis ‘Smaragd’—A semi-dwarf evergreen tree with a compact, narrow, upright growth habit, this American arborvitae is a selidwarf evergreen. One of the most common arborvitae plants for hedges and borders is the emerald Thuja.
  • Thuja standishii x plicata ‘Green Giant’—Excellent for privacy screens or hedges, this fast-growing conical-shaped tree.
  • Thuja occidentalis ‘Filips Magic Moment’—This bright, informal hedgerow would benefit from this golden-yellow evergreen tree with its upright, thick, columnar growth.

Leyland Cypress (Cupressus x leylandii)

Leyland Cypress is a popular hedging tree because of its fast, dense growth and year-long shelter, privacy, and protection. The large height of this kind of tree is the most popular reason for choosing it. Nevertheless, regular pruning keeps its form and height, and a square boxed Privacy Hedge and Sound Barrier may be built in no time.

One of the most popular hedging plants for privacy screens is the Leyland cypress, a fast-growing coniferous tree. These evergreen privacy trees, when grown side by side, grow into a thick garden screen that may be as short as 6 feet (2 meters) or as high as 22 feet (7 meters).

Hornbeam (Carpinus betulus)

Common hornbeam trees are semi-evergreen and can be pruned to form a formal dense privacy hedge. The hedging plants, on the other hand, provide some privacy even though they lose some leaves during the winter. Hornbeam trees develop thick, dense foliage throughout the growing season to create a complete living barrier.

The rapidly expanding trees can reach heights of up to 13 feet (4 meters) in just a few years. If you want to build a formal hedge, plant these privacy trees.

Canadian Hemlock (Tsuga canadensis)

This conifer species has rapid development and a pyramidal form, which makes it ideal for creating a fast-growing dense living fence. These evergreen trees, growing alongside each other in a dense sheltering hedge, are protected from the wind and noise. To make a gorgeous privacy barrier, simply cut the bushy tree down.

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