How to Water and Feed Pepper Plants
The short version: Water when the top inch of soil is dry, then soak until it drains out the bottom. Overwatering kills more indoor peppers than anything else, so when in doubt, wait. Once the plant is settled, feed every week or two, and switch to a bloom formula when flowers show up.
Start with the finger test
Stick your finger an inch into the soil. Dry? Water. Damp? Leave it alone. That one check answers most watering questions, and it beats any schedule you could write on a calendar.
When you do water, water deep. Soak until water runs out the drainage holes, then let the top inch dry before you do it again. Deep but infrequent is the pattern. Containers dry out faster in summer heat, so check daily when it's hot, and ease off in winter.
Overwatering is the common killer
Overwatering kills more indoor peppers than anything else. Not pests, not neglect. Too much attention with a watering can. Peppers want soil that's evenly moist but never waterlogged, and they hate wet feet.
The container matters as much as the schedule. No drainage holes means water sits at the roots and rots them, and that undoes everything else you did right. Use a well-draining mix and a container that drains, and the margin for error gets much wider. When in doubt, wait.
Bottom watering has a shelf life
Bottom watering, where the container sits in a tray of water and the soil pulls moisture up, works while the plant is young and the container is small.
It stops working once the plant is established in a large container. The root mass is too dense. Top water from there. That's not a preference, it's physics.
The first week: water first, food later
The day your plant lands, get it into soil and watered. If the root ball feels dry, water it slowly until it's evenly moist, then water it in after you container it up.
Hold off on the fertilizer, though. Don't feed immediately after repotting; give the plant a few days to settle without the added stress. Then fertilize within the first week. It isn't starting from zero in the meantime. Our plants grow with mycorrhizal fungi at the roots, a partnership that helps them take up water and nutrients.
The regular feeding schedule
Once the plant is settled and growing, feed every week or two through the growing season. A balanced vegetable fertilizer, or a tomato-and-pepper formula, is fine while it's putting on leaves.
When flowers appear, switch formulas. Go lighter on nitrogen and higher on phosphorus and potassium, which is what a bloom formula is. Staying heavy on nitrogen past that point buys you a big leafy plant and not many pods. The switch is what pushes flowers and fruit.
If feeding isn't working, check your water
Fertilizer only helps if the plant can take it up, and that depends on pH. Peppers want a pH of around 6.0 to 7.0. Outside that range they struggle to absorb nutrients regardless of what you pour in. A pack of pH strips and a minute with your tap water settles it.
One note if you use a multiprobe: it only reads accurately when the soil is moist. Dry soil gives garbage numbers. WikiPepper (wikipepper.org) covers the soil science in more depth.
That's the whole system. Finger in the soil, deep soak, food every week or two, bloom formula when flowers arrive. For variety-specific care, check the plant's own page in the shop.