Room Fit · furniture layout

Sample living room

Drag the furniture around this 16′ × 13′ room. The teal lines show how much space is left between the selected piece and the nearest wall or piece. Anything that overlaps or blocks the door turns red. To set up a real room, choose Start a new room and answer a few questions.

Furniture Rug (sits under things) Fixed in place Window sill or door trim (tap a window or door to add one) Door swing, keep clear Space a piece needs, such as a chair rolling back Conflict Space left around the selected piece Hover over or tap a wall to see the free lengths along it Dragging snaps to centres; hold Option (Alt) to drag freely

A few questions set up the walls, doors and windows. Furniture comes after.

Keep a copy of this room

Save a copy to keep it safe or to open it somewhere else.

–of the floor left open
–room floor area

Selected piece

Drag to move. Pieces snap flush when you bring them close to a wall. Rotate to turn the clear space to the side it belongs on. With the plan focused, arrow keys nudge 1″ (Shift for 6″) and R rotates.

From the list

Your own piece

What to measure

A rough sketch with the numbers written on it is enough. A photo of a page from a notebook works fine. Inches or centimetres, whichever the tape measure shows.

A B C D E F G H window door clockwise →

  1. Every wall, going clockwise from one corner. ABCD Measure wall to wall along the floor. An L-shaped room just has more walls.

  2. Both diagonals, corner to corner. EF If they match, the room is square. If they don't, the room is a little skewed, and the diagonals let it be drawn true.

  3. Ceiling height. Needed for the 3D view, tall bookcases and arches.

  4. Each door. G Distance from the nearest corner to the edge of the opening, the opening's width, which side the hinges are on, and whether it swings into the room.

  5. Each window. H Distance from the corner, width, height of the sill above the floor, and the window's height.

  6. Things that can't move. Radiators, vents, columns, built-ins, beams, and the outlets and switches that furniture shouldn't cover. For each one, where it is and how big it is.

  7. The furniture being considered. Width × depth × height. The numbers from a product page are fine.

Steps 1, 4 and 7 are enough for a first try. The rest makes the plan accurate enough for construction work.

Going further in 3D

This page answers “does it fit?” without installing anything. For colours, materials and a walk-through in 3D, a dedicated program helps. Here is the one that fits that job best, and how the others compare.

Sweet Home 3D

Free, no account, no time limit

It is built for exactly this job: draw the room from measurements, drop furniture in from a catalog, and move it around. A 3D view of the room updates next to the plan. It runs on Windows, Mac and Linux, works offline, and saves projects as .sh3d files on your computer.

How a room comes together
  • Click from corner to corner to draw the walls, typing each wall's length along the way.
  • Drag doors, windows, sofas, beds and cabinets in from the catalog.
  • Double-click any piece to type its exact size or change its colour.
  • Paint walls and pick floor textures, then walk through the room in 3D.
Good to know
  • Free under an open-source licence, for personal or commercial work.
  • Download it from sweethome3d.com. The app-store versions are paid copies of the same program, so there's no need to buy one.
  • Plans print to PDF for trades and contractors, and the 3D model exports to other programs.
  • It's for rooms and furniture. Custom arches or built-ins are where SketchUp is stronger.
OptionCostGood forThe catch
Sweet Home 3DFreeRoom layouts, furniture fit, quick 3D views. Learn it in an afternoon.Plainer-looking, and it doesn't model custom shapes well.
SketchUp FreeFree for personal use. Go is $129/yr, Pro is $399/yr.Building anything: arches, millwork, stucco details, landscaping. An industry standard for interior design.A general 3D tool with more to learn before it feels easy. It runs in the browser only and stores files in Trimble's cloud. Commercial work needs a paid plan.
FloorplannerFree basic planQuick floor plans in a browser.The free plan limits the number of projects and watermarks low-resolution exports.
Planner 5DFree tierA friendly app on phones and tablets.The free tier opens only a small share of the furniture catalog, and resizing pieces is restricted.

Suggested path: use this page for quick “does it fit?” checks. It takes no learning. For colours, materials and 3D views, move to Sweet Home 3D. To model the construction side, such as arches, niches and built-ins, try SketchUp Free on one personal project; a SketchUp Go licence covers commercial work.

How it works

MeasureSketch plus numbers

Using the list above. A phone photo of the sketch is fine.

Set up the roomWalls, doors, windows

Start a new room and answer a few questions. The plan draws itself as you go.

Try layoutsDrag, swap, compare

Try different furniture and spacing, and keep each version as its own option with “Duplicate as another option”.

Sources, checked October 2026: sweethome3d.com Floorplanner free plan, softpicker.com Planner 5D review, machow2.com SketchUp Free limits, snaptrude.com