Although most of the experience and leveling in FarmVille does come from the slow grind that is planting crops, there is a few things you can do to make your leveling faster and more enjoyable.
1. Help your friends. Probably the fastest way to gain experience is to visit your friends’ farms and help them out. This is why it’s important to get as many friends as possible. You can only visit each farm only once a day. The first 20 neighbors you help, you will get 20 XP and 5 coins. After that you will gain 5 XP and 1 coin. Get a lot of friends and visit them frequently and you will see a lot of XP! Make it a daily routine.
2. Consider harvesting time. If your time is limited you need to pay some attention to the harvest time of a crop when your planting it. This can dramatically improve your efficiency. If, for example, you plant some strawberries, you need to get back to them within 4-8 hours or they will wilt. Once you get a higher level this becomes easier since you can plant crops that take up to three days to grow and therefore you don’t have to visit your farm as frequently.
3. Buying stuff. If you’re plenty on the money and need a XP boost, you might want to consider buying animals and buildings. They both cost a lot, but you can get a nice experience jump from them. And of course, they have some uses as well. While animals might be expensive, you will eventually turn them into profit. They also act as sort of insurances since you can sell them if you get really low on cash. No, the resale value isn’t good but it can save you sometime.