5 Free Room Layout Planner Options [See It Before Starting]

If you’re planning to redesign a room in your home, you need to get the layout right. Here are 5 of the top free room layout planner options to try – and why!

Whether you’ve just moved into a new home and want to make it your own, or are looking for ways to change up your current decor, making decisions about interior design can be tricky. 

If you don’t have a lot of experience with room design, but don’t want to hire someone to do the job for you, you might be wondering where to start. 

In my experience, the best way to plan how you’re going to decorate one or multiple rooms in your house is to plan it out before you get started.

This will allow you to change layouts before it costs you anything (time OR effort). You can work out what works and what doesn’t before lifting a finger!

If you don’t want to draw things out yourself – or don’t have artistic skills – then why not use a room layout planner?

You can find a few great free options – and it’s definitely worth spending a little time looking at how they can help you.

So – why not delve into your inner interior designer, and get planning – the easy way!

Room Layout Planner Free Options Available:

#1 – Planner5d

The interface for Planner5d is highly intuitive and easy to use without any training. Editing is available in 2D and 3D so you can choose your viewpoint depending on what you feel most comfortable with. 

Once you’ve laid the foundations of your room plan, you can start decorating with a library of over 5,000 items of furniture. The wide range of furniture to choose from makes it easy to create a room plan that is entirely your own.

You can even create custom colours and patterns for the wallpaper and other items in your room, ensuring that your design is as close to yours as you can make it.

When you’re finished, you can use the Snapshots feature within the app to take a 3D, HD photograph of your design and share it with others. Useful if you want to check things out with other members of your family and get the OK with them that it’s a design that will work.

#2 – Roomstyler

Roomstyler is considered a great room planning tool for beginners, so if you’re totally new to interior design, this may be a good option to start out with. 

This room planner is easy to use thanks to the drag and drop editing feature that allows you to take any of the branded furniture items (120,000 items available) from the menu and place them wherever you want in your room. 

Unfortunately you can’t edit in 3D mode when you use Roomstyler, which is a bit of a hindrance, especially considering that 3D editing is a fairly standard feature for room planner apps.

Roomstyler basically keeps you in a top-down view while editing (like you’re working from a sheet of paper). However, you can hover the cursor over the camera icon to see a 3D preview of your room while remaining in 2D editing mode. 

Another brilliant feature of this option is that if you need some inspiration before you start putting your room together, you can also use Roomstyler’s mood board creator feature to get some ideas. 

This will bring the interior designer out of you more than anything!

#3 – Room Sketcher

Using RoomSketcher, you can create your room design really easily on your computer (or tablet).

It’s easy to get started because you just draw your floor plan, choose your furnishings from a library of 10,000+ items, and then you can see your room design in 3D.

There is a free option that has plenty of functionality if you want to just create floor plans to check your layout is going to work OK – but you can upgrade if you want. I won’t talk about upgrade options here as we’re just talking about free stuff here.

#4 – Plan Your Room

Plan Your Room is a simple 2D drag and drop floor plan layout option that’s totally free to use.

It’s a great basic option that will work for you when you just want a quick idea of how your room will work when furniture is placed where you’re thinking of putting it.

#5 – Home Styler

Homestyler is designed to be usable by both professional designers and complete beginners, so whether room planning is part of your day job or a new hobby, this could work for you!

You start the Homestyler room planning process with the 2D drawing tool, which allows you to outline the shape and size of your room intuitively, just like you would with a pen and paper.

Alternatively, you can even take a picture of a real room in your home as the basis for your design and then redesign it completely! This is a great feature as you can start with your room as it currently is – especially if it’s empty right now.

From there, you can add smaller features to your room plan using the broad menu of branded furniture items. 

If you’re coming to Homestyler as a complete beginner, you can make use of the beginner guide and the tutorial videos before you get started. This will help you to understand the app better and make the most of all the features. 

A free version of Homestyler is available if you don’t want to pay (which is why it’s included in this list), but the features are very limited and you won’t be able to make use of the collaborative function. If you want any of the more customisable features, you’ll need to pay on a monthly basis. 

Things To Consider When Choosing A Room Layout Planner

There are so many great options out there to choose from – so what should you be looking for?

You should be able to select the best one for your particular needs depending on what you want your design experience and finished results to look like. 

2D vs. 3D

Most good-quality room planners have the option to edit your design in both 2D or 3D mode. This is not always the case, but most designers find this to be the best way to create a design that is actually functional since the 3D view gives a clearer picture of what the space would actually look like. 

If you do choose a room planner app that primarily allows editing in 2D, make sure that it at least has a 3D rendering or 3D preview tool so that you can see what the design would look like in real life.

Many interior designers can attest to the fact that just because something looks as though it would work in 3D during the initial 2D drawing phases doesn’t necessarily mean it will. 

Interface

In general, drag and drop interfaces tend to be the best for beginners as well as professionals simply because they are so intuitive. 

Ideally, the interface for the room planner app that you choose should be free from unnecessary clutter and easy to navigate at a glance. 

Now, if the interface on an app does look a little more complicated, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t consider it. If you’re initially not sure if the app is too advanced for you, check to see if tutorials are included to help you out. 

Furniture Options

If you don’t have any furniture to put in your room plan, it will end up looking fairly empty and unoriginal. That’s why most room planner apps have libraries of furniture (often real, branded furniture) that you can incorporate into your plan. 

When choosing a room planner app, pay attention to the size of the furniture library that is included with the subscription. These libraries can range in size from 5,000 items to 60,000 items, and the more choices are available to you, the better your finished room plan is likely to look.

Customisation 

If you want to be able to plan a room that’s completely unique, you will need to choose an app with as many features for customisation as possible. 

I’ve already discussed the importance of having an extensive library of furniture to choose from, but even this won’t necessarily be enough to make your room design 100% your own. 

The most custom-friendly room planner apps will give you the option to create your own colours and patterns using drawing tools and colour wheels. 

While most room planner apps will have multiple options available in terms of room size and shape, I personally recommend prioritising those that allow you to draw the shape and size yourself, or even take a photograph of an existing room and edit it within the app. These features give you much more freedom when it comes to customisation and originality, and photo editing functions in particular are useful if you’re redecorating your own home. 

Walkthroughs

I definitely recommend getting a room planner app that includes a 3D walkthrough function. 

While being able to simply view your finished room plan in 3D is a good start, it’s even better if you can get a realistic walkthrough of the room you have created. This is the best way to get a real sense for what it would actually be like to be inside the room you have designed.