Dill Seed vs. Dill Weed: How They Compare

Same plant, two different flavors. Dill weed, the feathery leaf of Anethum graveolens, an annual in the parsley family, is fresh, grassy and delicate, so it goes in near the end. Dill seed is the dried fruit: warmer, caraway-like and sturdy enough to cook. Its oil is led by limonene and carvone,¹ the same pair that leads caraway oil,² and the seed carries far more oil than the leaf. In pickles you can swap one for the other at a published ratio, but rarely anywhere else.

Side by side

	Dill seed	Dill weed
Plant	Anethum graveolens, Apiaceae	Same plant
Part used	The small dry fruit, often mistaken for a seed: broadly oval, about 3.5 mm long, light brown	The leaves and small stems, plus immature flower heads, used fresh or dried
When it’s harvested	When the fruits are fully developed but still green, 7 to 9 days after the petals drop¹	Usually before flowering, about 40 to 50 days after sowing¹
Essential oil	2 to 6 percent (PROSEA);¹ about 3 percent, mainly carvone (Britannica)³	0.1 to 1.5 percent of the dry herb (PROSEA)¹
Leading oil compounds	Limonene up to 70% and carvone up to 60% (PROSEA);¹ carvone 40 to 60% and limonene about 40% (Katzer)⁴	Phellandrene about 35% and dill ether about 25% (PROSEA);¹ carvone 30 to 40%, limonene 30 to 40%, phellandrene 10 to 20%, with dill ether characteristic (Katzer)⁴
In the heat	Sturdier; LSU AgCenter lists dill seed among herbs that can go in the last 20 minutes;⁵ Katzer says the fruits are briefly fried in hot fat to develop their aroma⁴	Delicate; best added at the end, since prolonged heat costs flavor and aroma (LSU AgCenter)⁵
Typical uses	With the flower heads, pickled cucumbers and onions, vinegar, sauces, pastries and bread; in India, curry powder and dals	Soups, salads and sauces; fish, where Katzer says the leaves are preferred; a garnish for boiled potatoes in the Baltic states
Flavor	Warm, sharper and caraway-like, a little bitter	Fresh, grassy and lighter

The two sources disagree about the leaf oil. PROSEA puts phellandrene and dill ether on top; Katzer lists carvone and limonene first, with phellandrene lower and dill ether as the characteristic leaf compound.¹⁴ Leaf oil varies with the plant and the sample, so we show both instead of picking one. On the seed they agree: carvone and limonene lead.

Why they taste different

The chemistry explains most of it. Dill seed’s oil is dominated by carvone and limonene, the same two compounds Britannica names as the main components of caraway oil.² That’s why Britannica describes dill’s flavor as warm, slightly sharp and somewhat like caraway.³ The leaf has much less oil overall, 0.1 to 1.5 percent of the dry herb against 2 to 6 percent in the fruit, and its oil is marked by phellandrene and dill ether.⁴ PROSEA describes dill as having a pleasant aromatic smell but a slightly bitter and pungent taste,¹ without saying which part it means.

Katzer adds that fresh dill herb is much more aromatic than dried, with a much sweeter fragrance than the dried fruits. He also notes that Indian cooks use the dried fruits instead of the leaves, and that Indian dill fruits taste more pungent than European dill.⁴

How each is cooked

Dill weed goes in late. LSU AgCenter lists dill leaves with basil, chives, cilantro, parsley and mint as delicate herbs to add at the end, and warns that long heat costs flavor and aroma.⁵ America’s Test Kitchen also groups dill with the delicate, more volatile herbs.⁶ PROSEA notes that leaving harvested dill to dry in the field loses a lot of oil to evaporation, especially the more volatile terpenes.¹

Dill seed can go in earlier. LSU AgCenter puts dill seeds with oregano, rosemary and thyme among the sturdier seasonings you can add in the last 20 minutes.⁵ In Indian cooking, Katzer writes, dill fruits get a quick fry in hot fat to develop their aroma, like many related spices.⁴

Where each is used

Pickles. Dill’s flower heads and ripe fruits flavor pickled cucumbers, onions and vinegar, and Katzer says fresh dill sprigs are mandatory in most European pickle recipes of this kind.⁴
Fish. Dill goes with fish, and Katzer says the leaves are preferred for it.⁴
Breads and pastries. The fruits go into pastries and bread.
India. The fruits go into curry powder in India, and dill is an occasional spice in dals.
Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. Dill is especially popular in these cuisines. It flavors Scandinavian fish and shellfish dishes, and chopped dill gets sprinkled over boiled potatoes in the Baltic states.
Herbal vinegar. Katzer says dill adds depth and body to herbal vinegar and should never be left out.⁴

Can one stand in for the other?

In pickles. Ratio (Attributed): The National Center for Home Food Preservation’s tested recipe for quick fresh-pack dill pickles gives each pint jar either 1½ heads of fresh dill or 1½ teaspoons of dill seed.⁷ That works out to 1 teaspoon of seed per flower head. Note that it means flower heads, not leaves. For canned pickles, stick to a tested recipe; the Center says not to change the proportions of vinegar, food and water.⁸ Since the tested recipe itself offers either form, this swap stays within its tested proportions.

Dill weed in place of seed elsewhere. The leaf carries far less oil than the seed,¹ so expect a lighter, greener result, and add the leaves at the end, not the start.⁵

Dill seed in place of dill weed. Ratio (Method): crush the seed and start small, about a quarter of the volume of chopped fresh dill called for, then taste. Its carvone-and-limonene oil is the caraway pair,¹² so it’ll taste warmer and less fresh. It suits cooked dishes and dressings better than garnishes.

Fresh and dried dill weed. Ratio (Attributed): for fresh-to-dried leaf swaps, LSU AgCenter’s general rule is that one tablespoon of fresh herbs equals one teaspoon of dried.⁵ See fresh dill vs. dried dill.

What isn’t known

PROSEA and Katzer disagree on leaf oil, and neither says why (cultivar, origin, plant stage, method).
You’ll often hear that dill seed gets stronger when heated. None of the sources we reviewed measured that; Katzer says only that frying develops the aroma.

Dill, dill substitutes, cooking with dill, how to store dill and too much dill?
Fresh dill vs. dried dill, fennel vs. dill and tarragon vs. dill
Caraway seeds and pickling spice

Nguyen Thi Tâm, C.C. de Guzman and P.C.M. Jansen, Anethum graveolens, Plant Resources of South-East Asia (PROSEA). uses.plantnet-project.org · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹²
“Caraway”, Encyclopaedia Britannica. britannica.com · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³
“Dill”, Encyclopaedia Britannica. britannica.com · Reference work ↩ ↩²
Gernot Katzer, “Dill (Anethum graveolens)”, Gernot Katzer’s Spice Pages. gernot-katzers-spice-pages.com · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰
“Flavorful Herbs”, LSU AgCenter. lsuagcenter.com · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶
“Science: Substituting Dried Herbs for Fresh”, America’s Test Kitchen. americastestkitchen.com · Publication ↩
“Quick Fresh-Pack Dill Pickles”, National Center for Home Food Preservation. nchfp.uga.edu · Reference work ↩
“General Information on Pickling”, National Center for Home Food Preservation. nchfp.uga.edu · Reference work ↩

Also drawn on

Anethum graveolens L., Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. powo.science.kew.org

Dill Seed vs. Dill Weed: Same Plant, Different Oils