The Best Home Design Software

Home redesigning is a significant long-term investment, so mistakes such as wrongly chosen paint color or furniture are the last thing you want to do. Thankfully, gone are the days wherein people need to sketch the designs of their future homes because you can now do it on your computers. Home modeling software lets you bring your ideas to life and experiment endlessly until you’re 100% satisfied with the result, helping to avoid issues in practice. If you’re looking for a user-friendly home design app to help you visualize your dream home, we’re here to help.

There are various options on the market, each with its fair share of similar and unique features. In this guide, we’ll share the best home design software available on the market in 2022. We included an option for most experience levels, whether you’re a beginner or a professional. You will also get choices for those on a budget and those willing to splurge for reliable software packed with premium features. Read on to find the right program for you to create a custom home exterior, interior, and landscape design.

SketchUp Pro features an expansive toolset and is suitable for personal, professional, and educational purposes. Depending on the required functionality, the software offers several pricing plans. We highly suggest you get the Pro plan which costs $299 annually.

SketchUp Pro provides the best deals for students, so if you’re currently enrolled in an interior design or architectural college, this one may be a good deal. A 30-day free trial is available to let you test out all the features. With SketchUp Pro, you can create 3D models of homes or other building constructions using a simple click-and-drag editor. To start, you can choose one of the pre-uploaded templates or create a house from scratch. Along with the house’s 3D plan, you can develop elevations, exterior elements, detailed plans, and more.

Your 3D plan can be automatically optimized and converted into 2D for printing. All pricing plans include unlimited cloud storage, so you never miss a project. Professional plans include various view types, including the use of an augmented reality headset and mobile viewer. You can get right into your newly projected house with a VR headset such as Oculus Rift or Hololens. You can also adjust element color and transparency, create photorealistic rendering, create dynamic components, and more. Users can use SketchUp Pro on their computers, web browsers, or iPad.

Pros

• Several pricing plans for different needs
• Photorealistic rendering and dynamic component rendering
• Unlimited cloud storage
• VR headset view

Cons

• Drawing models from scratch is more complicated than in some competitor software
• Tricky 3D view navigation
• Pricey

Virtual Architect Ultimate Home with Landscaping & Decks Design 11 is a professional software focused on creating exterior and landscape design. However, the software doesn’t lack some impressive interior design options too. Virtual Architect lets you create custom 2D or 3D floor plans, and choose the materials, textures, colors, etc. In other words, it has all the essential features of a proper home modeling app.

What makes it different is that you can place your house into a setting and select plants for your garden, stones for pathways, or outdoor lighting. Photorealistic backdrops and natural lighting options make your project appear very real. Additionally, the software features advanced tools for door and window design. The software offers an extensive product catalog containing furnishing, décor items, and artworks. Furthermore, you can add your own photos to the design to better visualize the result. For instance, you can have your own family sit on a couch – a great way to persuade your partner to purchase it. Of course, your project can then be converted to 2D or rendered in 3D. Virtual Architect Ultimate Home with Landscaping & Decks Design 11 will cost you $99.99 to purchase.

Pros

• Advanced landscaping options
• Realistic natural lighting and backdrops
• Upload own photos to design
• Great tools for door and window design

Cons

• Some lag with low-powered hardware
• Projects don’t look as realistic as in some competitor software

Home Designer Pro is software for professionals or house design enthusiasts who wish to create highly complex projects. The software lets you design exteriors and interiors, create definite floor plans with custom measurements, and view the project in 2D, 3D, or cross-section.

Let’s start by reviewing Home Designer Pro’s architectural capabilities. The software automatically generates customizable framing elements, such as rafters, beams, trusses, posts, and others, based on your measurements. You can create a custom roof or ceiling from scratch or choose among one of the standard templates. Scaled construction documents can be printed at any size with 3D, CAD, cross-section, or elevation.

As for interior design tools, Home Designer Pro provides an extensive toolset for you to create realistic projects. You can construct custom stairs, straight or curved, by setting a custom starter tread and width. You can also edit wall construction and add floor structures, platforms, mudsills, and more. Additionally, you can create horizontal or vertical layouts for doors, drawers, and cabinets. You can easily bring any idea to life with a wide range of color and texture options and an impressive object catalog.

The software’s professional features include custom watermarks, sun angle calculation and visualization, advanced CAD tools, and more. Apart from the house’s design, you can create terrain and site plans, including lot boundaries, setback requirements, and other building requirement information. Customers can rent the software for $59 monthly or purchase it for a one-time fee of $595.

Pros

• Advanced, extensive tools
• Terrain plan and building requirement data
• Custom watermarks
• Realistic sun angle calculation and visualization
• Different views

Cons

• It may be too complex for beginners
• Expensive

Sweet Home 3D is one of the simplest apps in our guide. It’s completely free and available both online and as desktop software. The web version lets you create custom 2D floor plans and choose furnishing, lighting, and décor items from the catalog. While the catalog doesn’t feature actual items with purchase links, it can give you the gist of which furniture style to choose in the future.

The desktop version has more advanced features, including 3D modeling and animation. With the help of a click-and-drag editor, you can freely move around your project house to visualize it in every detail. Apart from interior design, you can also create the house’s exterior and landscape models. You will get two options when purchasing: a free and paid version. The free version comes with 26 textures and 100 pieces of furniture, while the paid version ($12.99) comes with 418 textures and 1,500 pieces of furniture.

Pros

• Very simple
• Web and desktop versions
• Free
• Interior, exterior, landscape design
• No experience required

Cons

• Products in the catalog are a bit scarce
• Not photorealistic
• Will need the paid version for more textures and pieces of furniture

Room Sketcher features an intuitive, beginner-friendly interface and some impressive functionality in professional software. The app is compatible with Mac and Windows PCs and is free to install. However, you’ll have to purchase one of the paid plans to access all the tools. Thankfully, there are a variety of plans to choose from, and custom plans are also available. Like most home design apps, Room Sketcher allows you to draw a floor plan according to your measurements or upload a blueprint.

Once you add your floor plan, you can edit your space in 2D or 3D renderings. Choose among different colors, textures, and material options for floors, walls, and other surfaces. A catalog of actual products offers thousands of items to fill your project house, including furnishings and décor elements from popular brands such as IKEA. The click-and-drag editor doesn’t require any previous experience in home modeling, so even beginners can easily pick it up. You can review the results in 360-degree views and make beautiful 3D pictures to get the full effect. However, unlike some competitor apps, Room Sketcher doesn’t offer photorealistic 3D plans. Room Sketcher’s basic plan costs $38 per level, their VIP plan is $49 per year, and their most popular option, the Pro plan, costs $99 annually.

Pros

• Intuitive interface
• Compatible with Mac and Windows
• Extensive catalog with real products
• Draw floor plans or upload a blueprint

Cons

• No exterior design capabilities
• The result doesn’t look photorealistic
• Need one of the premium plan for complete features

HomeStyler is an advanced and versatile software suitable for professionals and beginners, thanks to two versions – free and paid. The free version is more than functional, but it comes with limitations. It would be best to get one of the premium plans. They have a Pro and Master plan with a monthly cost of $4.9 and $9.9, respectively. You can also get a Team plan for $19.6 per seat a month or the Enterprise plan, which has customer pricing. While the monthly subscription doesn’t seem pricey, the annual cost of the software dents a few people’s budgets.

HomeStyler’s Pro version has some ambitious tools unavailable in most competitor software. For instance, you can render projects in 4K, create 10K panoramas, render videos and create integrative lighting mixes. You can also pay for specific features per number of projects. Costs may vary depending on the particular feature and number of projects. The software lets you create custom 2D and 3D floor plans based on your measurements and design the space in detail.

An object library contains thousands of genuine furnishing products, artworks, flooring and wallpaper options, and small décor elements with purchase links. Finally, you can create photorealistic renders to bring your ideas to life. The panoramic 3D view can be later converted into 2D to share your project with clients or friends. The Master plan is more expensive than the Pro plan because you get unlimited 4K image rendering, more 8K&12K panorama rendering quota, more video rendering quota, and you can upload up to 500 of your own 3D models,

Pros

• Photorealistic projects
• A broad library with purchase links
• Free version and option to pay per feature
• 4K and video rendering
• Integrative lighting mixes

Cons

• Free version has significant limitations
• Some features reportedly don’t work smoothly

There’s no need to install desktop software if you’re only starting your home designer journey or wish to create a quick project of your own home. Space Designer 3D is a simple web-based software that lets you create a detailed floor plan or a 3D model of the house’s interior and exterior.

The software features an object catalog offering various indoor and outdoor furnishing, lighting, and home décor items. Unlike Homestyler, Space Designer 3D doesn’t provide an option to purchase the selected objects. However, this way, you can get an idea of what to search for in-store. One of the software’s advantages is the ability to set custom house and room dimensions. Thus, you can either replicate your existing home or build one you’re only looking forward to buying. The house can have several levels.

Additionally, you can select different natural lighting to visualize how your project will look at night or on a sunny day. Once the project is done, you can convert it into a 2D view to print or save it to your device or share it on social media.

Pros

• Web-based software
• Free
• User-friendly
• Multiple floor plans
• Large object catalog

Cons

• No photorealistic view
• Not enough tools for professionals

If you aren’t a professional architect and wish to try your hand at design without investing in professional software, Homestyler may be the perfect option. Homestyler is user-friendly and free and available on Android and iOS. Start by snapping pictures of your room in the app and converting them into a 3D view, and you’re ready to create something new.

You can try out the different wall and floor colors and textures, find real furniture and décor products from a catalog, and place them in your space. All the products can later be purchased via the app, so you can get them instantly if you fall in love with a specific sofa. Homestyler isn’t just an interior modeling app; it’s also a community of enthusiastic stylers from all over the world.

You can share your projects, get inspiration by browsing the works of others or receive feedback. Naturally, you can also share your projects on your Facebook or other social pages, converted into a 2D view. All the works look photorealistic, precisely as they would in real life.

Pros

• Realistic interiors
• International community
• Real catalog
• Create room plans
• Free mobile app

Cons

• You can’t create custom items
• You can’t adjust the room dimensions