Rob

That seems to be quite reasonable. I am probably less careful :) I try to get them out as early as possible in Spring, when sunshine is not strongest yet. I also try to bring them out when forecast calls for few partially or mostly cloudy days in a row, and put them right away in their final position. Obviously, that is not always possible but I try. If I move them, most often it is only once. Not that I never had some sunburned leaves !:) - but not too often. I don't remember killing plants from sun exposure. Another trick I use is putting bigger potted plants in front of the succulents for few days, to create dappled effect.

When I had fewer plants, I used to put them all on a table in full sunlight, but open an sunbrella around noon that would cast shade during hours of strongest sun. I have many more now, and try to move them as little as possible.

It may also depends om plants. I keep haws on a shelve that gets sunshine from sunrise until about 10 - 11 am. After that, it gets 'shadier' because of neighbours birch tree. They seem to like it there.

This thread might be of help:

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5297515/whats-your-regimen-for-acclimating-your-plants-to-outside-for-summer#n=11

Edit: I see you posted there. :) I'm only on my third year of bringing plants outside. They were inside for about 20. Burned cactus the first year.

What I'm learning is that plants generally need more time that I thought, and ironically, it seems that many cactus can take a little longer to acclimate than other succulents. I've read from experienced cactus growers who take 3-4 weeks to acclimate their plants if they were indoors or bought from a nursery. I'm used to hardening off my Coleuses in a week, but they're mostly in shade. I'm not sure if this is actually the case, but since succulents are in outdoor sun, they may take longer to acclimate than if they were in shade. But since, succulents love sun, maybe that's not the case.

Rina's method sounds ideal. I was able to do a little of that, but then we got 90 degree (F) days that messed things all up.

Other factors I wonder about: does having plants in sun through a window decrease the time needed to acclimate compared to grow lights or just bright light? How much do plants have to acclimate to UV light, since windows block it (as far as I know)? I'm asking because cloudy light can have UV rays (again, as far as I know), so I wonder if they need to be acclimated even to that if it's warmer out.

The plants in my greenhouse go out first, and they go directly into full sun. Outside sun is brighter than full sun in the greenhouse, but it's not too big a step up, especially in spring.

The ones in the house then go into the greenhouse, and after a couple of weeks go outside. I do have shades in the greenhouse, so I can modify the amount of sun when the house plants first get moved into the greenhouse. I have a few that are real heat lovers that I keep in the greenhouse, since our night temperatures often get down well into the 50's.

Sun through a really sunny window in a house will be less than the sun through a greenhouse, and quite a bit less than outside, so will need to be acclimated no matter the temperature.