3 Free Online Kitchen Design Softwares
- Our Comparison & Review

If you’re planning on a kitchen remodel, and you want to know what it will look like before you spend all that money on an expensive renovation, you can try out some free kitchen design software, and design what you really want, for free. We’ve picked the 3 most popular - or best - free kitchen design software packages and compared them for use, learning curve, and cost if you choose to upgrade to pro versions (where applicable).

The 3 free kitchen design softwares we compared are:

• FloorPlanner
• Plan3D
• Google SketchUp

Our Free Kitchen Design Software Comparison Reviews

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Kitchen Design Software #1 - FloorPlanner.com

FloorPlanner is an easy to learn tool for creating and sharing interactive kitchen or whole home floor plans. The free version is called My Floorplanner.

With My Floorplanner you can create one kitchen design project made up of 5 different kitchen designs. You can draw, add appliances and furniture, save your design, then share or print the 2D floor plan of your kitchen design. It’s easy to create a floorplan then add kitchen appliances, kitchen fixtures and furniture. Easily customize kitchen surfaces, area sizes, textures and colors.

Sharing is easy:

After creating a floor plan, click the ‘Share’ tab. You can share by email, picture, widget or web. With the email option you can send a personal message with a link back to your design at FloorPlanner.com. Clicking the picture option allows you to export then print a picture of your kitchen design plan.

This is a whole house plan I did at FloorPlanner.com - notice the details you can add to the kitchen?

The widget option provides a link to embed your design right into your own web page. If you choose to share via the web, they provide two links for copying and pasting. One is to your collection of designs and the other is to the current plan only.

View other people’s floor plans under the ‘Fresh’ heading.

Advantages/Strengths

The learning curve is simple and almost non-existent. This is a very intuitive software. If you do have any difficulties you can check out the forums, interactive manual or their blog.
No downloads required.
Convenient ‘undo’ and ‘redo’ buttons.
The tool panels are drag and drop so they don’t get in the way, but are still easily accessible.

Disadvantages/Weaknesses

Free account does not offer 3D options.
Free accounts can only export images that are 640 x 480.
Can only create single floor designs.

Pay Versions

There are two pay versions of FloorPlanner available.

Plus Membership
$30.50/year
Allows you to create up to 5 complete projects with multiple floors and save unlimited design variations within each project.

Pro Membership
$24.50/month with a 30-day free trial.
Geared towards real estate agents /interior designers. Allows for the creation of interactive floor plans that can be published with a branded template and company logo.

• unlimited amount of floor plans
• export high quality images for brochures and print
• view plans in 3D
• monitor statistics of floor plans
• use lead generation
• Publish credits – 1 publish = 1 credit – credits are purchased separately

Our Opinion/Recommendations

My Floorplanner is an excellent kitchen design and floor planning tool if 3D is not a requirement.. It’s fun and so easy to use.

Because of the small scale of print outs and pictures, it’s easier to look at your floor plans when you don’t add in a whole lot of furniture, colours and textures.

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Kitchen Design Software #2 - Plan3D

With the free version of Plan3D you can easily design kitchens, as well as design single or multi-floor buildings in blueprint mode and in 3D. You can trace kitchen design floor plans into Plan3D software to create a 3D model, then take a virtual walk through your new kitchen design. View your design in different modes, including; overhead, blueprint, 3D, and elevation. The lighting and shadow functions create a realistic 3D effect, and has animated doors, windows and kitchen drawers. Enabling the ‘lock’ option on your fixtures or layout prevents accidentally moving or modifying objects or building features.

DOWNLOAD REQUIRED
System Requirements – Laptop or PC with Windows XP, Vista or 2000, minimum of 256 MB memory and a 3D video card

Advantages/Strengths

Plan3D is a relatively easy to use free kitchen design software once you’ve become accustomed to it. It includes a helpful ‘tips’ window to help with common functions. For more in depth assistance you can access an online manual through the help menu.

Disadvantages/Weaknesses

With the free version you can’t save your design plans. You are allowed to print a floor plan in the blueprint mode, but 2D printouts of 3D designs are fairly limited in terms of details you can see.

Examples of printed designs:

Some options/items can only be added in 3D mode. We had some difficulty getting a kitchen faucet to land on the sink ledge.
When using lighting and shadows, the editing speed is slowed down.

Pay Versions

There are two different options for paid subscriptions.

Option I
$15.95 for one month

Option II
$35.40 for one year ($2.95/month) Annual payment required.

Our Opinion/Recommendations

Plan3D is a great tool for taking your kitchen designs to the next level. Too bad the free version doesn’t allow you to save your designs. The yearly subscription amount seems exceptionally reasonable if you really want the option of saving your plans.

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Kitchen Design Software #3 - Google Sketchup

Google SketchUp Design Software is a very powerful 3D modeling package for creating anything in 3D, including kitchens. If you can picture it in your head, including a kitchen blender, you can design and create it with this software. The current free version is called Google SketchUp 6. You can make simple line type conceptual models or create complete, complex, accurate and real-life like designs. Google SketchUp is not only perfect for designing your new kitchen, but also for designing and building architectural, mechanical and landscape 3D models that can be shared in Google Earth or added to a 3D warehouse. The 3D design warehouse contains thousands of 3D items that can be downloaded for use in your kitchen design models. You can easily export 2D images of your 3D kitchen design models.

System Requirements

Here is a 2D image of our 3D test model.

Advantages/Strengths

Google SketchUp is easy to learn and easy to use - IF you have a few hours to devote to the learning curve. It offers abundant support for users – all of which can be accessed through the Learning Center.

The Learning Center offers helpful tips and provides easy access to additional design and help resources. The first page of the learning center tips shows an animated example of using SketchUp and it includes a link to a SketchUp model where you can learn about and try the various tools for yourself.

Disadvantages/Weaknesses

Large learning curve.

Pay Version

Google SketchUp Pro 6: $495
The pro version allows designers and planners to explore, communicate and present complex 3D concepts. It has speed and functionality suitable for use in professional environments. The paid version includes a beta feature called LayOut which enables the output of large-format, high-resolution documents.

Our Opinion/Recommendations

Google SketchUp is a great and powerful kitchen design tool, but be prepared to invest a significant amount of time to learning how to use it. It may be more than you need, but the price is certainly right (for the free version)!

 

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Our Final Recommendations

For quick and easy floor plan kitchen design projects that don’t require a lot of detail: FloorPlanner.com

For more detailed kitchen designs with the ability to draw in 3D, as well as being fairly easy to learn: Plan3D

For those who need to design every last detail and have the time to do it: Google SketchUp 3D