Home design software: what is free, and what it costs
Three of these are free and stay free. Two can still be bought once. The rest rent by the month, and the best-known DIY tool among them stopped selling a licence this year and now costs $495 a year.
Every price below was read off the vendor’s own page in September 2026, not copied from a roundup. Two of them moved over the summer.
The one-time purchase did not die with it. It just moved somewhere nobody looks. Below is what nine options actually cost, every figure read off the vendor’s own page, and which class of tool the job you have in mind really needs.
One is built for structural work and the other is not, so this is not a like-for-like. It is still one payment against $495 every year, and worth knowing before the first one.
Checked September 2026
What it costs, from the vendors
Prices read off each vendor’s own pricing page rather than from a round-up. Every name links to the page the figure came from, so you can check it went stale before you trust it.
| Tool | Price | Billing | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sweet Home 3D | Freeopen source | Free | No paid tier at all. Dated interface, exports plans and 3D, and nothing is withheld from you. |
| HomeByMe Starter | Free2 projects | Free | Runs in a browser. Two projects and five Full HD renders; Essentials lifts that to unlimited projects at $25 a month paid annually. |
| Coohom Basic | Free3 projects | Free | Free renders carry a watermark and come at 1K. Pro removes both at $15 a month. Prices vary by country — these are the USD ones. |
| Live Home 3D Standard | $69.99once, lifetime | One-time | The cheapest real one-time licence left in the category, listed at $69.99 and often on sale nearer $59.99. Was $49.99 in August, so the gap to a subscription is closing. |
| Live Home 3D Pro | $149.99once, lifetime | One-time | Adds the tools a remodel needs. Also up since August, when it was $99.99. |
| SmartDraw | $9.95per month, billed annually | Subscription | Ranks near the top of this search under the word "free", which here means a trial: there is no free tier. $9.95 is an introductory rate for new customers, $10.95 after. |
| Planner 5D Premium | $59.99per year | Subscription | Browser-based and the easiest start of the group, but aimed at rooms rather than at structure. Buy it on the website, not in the app. |
| SketchUp Go | $129per year | Subscription | General 3D modelling rather than home design. Web and iPad only — the desktop app starts at Pro, $399 a year. No free plan any more. |
| Home Designer | $495per year | Subscription | Chief Architect’s DIY line, and the one built properly for a whole house. $79 a month if you pay monthly. There is a free trial and no longer a licence to buy. |
Checked September 2026
Three jobs, and the expensive way to get it wrong
These tools market themselves almost identically, which is why people routinely buy the structural one to arrange a sofa. Decide which of these you are doing first; the price follows from it.
You are moving walls
A remodel, an extension, a loft conversion: anything where the structure changes. This is what Home Designer and Chief Architect are built for, and the reason they cost what they cost. Furniture tools will let you draw a wall but will not help you think about one.
Home Designer, or Live Home 3D Pro at a third of one year of it if the project is modest.
You are laying out rooms in a house you are not changing
The walls stay where they are and the question is what goes between them. Almost nothing in the expensive tier helps here, and the free and cheap options are genuinely sufficient.
Sweet Home 3D or HomeByMe free, or Live Home 3D Standard at $69.99 if you want it offline and yours.
You are furnishing, and someone has to buy the result
The plan is settled and the work is choosing pieces, checking they fit, and producing something orderable. Every tool above stops at the picture, and the list is your problem.
This is the part we build.
Where we come in, and where we do not
Decato is not home design software. It does not move a wall, model a roof or produce a drawing set, and if your project is structural then every option in the table above is a better use of your money than we are.
What it does is the part all of them stop before: turning a settled plan into named furniture you can order , matched to the room, refused if it does not clear the walkways, and handed back as a priced list with a render built from those exact products.
Mac and Windows. Planning runs free on your own ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini key; product matching and renders start at $20 a month.
Common questions
Is there still home design software you can buy once?
Yes, but not where most people look for it. Live Home 3D sells a lifetime Standard licence at $69.99 and Pro at $149.99. Both went up over the summer: in August they were $49.99 and $99.99. Chief Architect’s Home Designer, the better-known DIY product, consolidated its Suite, Architectural and Professional editions into one product with the 2026 version and no longer sells a licence at all (Checked September 2026).
What is the cheapest home design software that is actually good?
Sweet Home 3D if free is the constraint: it is open source, has no paid tier, and will draw a plan and furnish it in 3D. It looks its age, and that is the whole compromise. If you want something modern that stays yours, Live Home 3D Standard is $69.99 once.
What is the difference between home design and interior design software?
Structure. Home design tools model the building (walls, roofs, floors, stairs) because their user is changing it. Interior tools assume the building is fixed and work on what goes inside. Buying the first when you needed the second is the expensive mistake in this category, and it is easy to make because the marketing overlaps almost completely.
What is 3D home builder software, and is it different from this?
It is the same shelf under a different name. "Builder" there means the software builds the house on screen, the way a website builder builds a page — it is not software for a construction firm. Every tool in the table above is what that phrase returns. Software for people who build houses for a living is a separate category entirely: job costing, schedules, subcontractors and invoices, sold by the likes of Buildertrend and Sage.
Do I need 3D, or is a floor plan enough?
For your own decisions a plan is usually enough: you are checking whether things fit, which is a two-dimensional question. 3D earns its keep when you have to show the room to somebody who cannot read a plan, which for most people means a partner, a client or a planning committee.
Is Decato home design software?
No, and it is worth saying plainly on this page. It does not move walls, model a roof or draw a construction set. It reads a floor plan you already have and turns it into furniture you can buy, matched to real products, checked against the walls, priced. If your project is structural, everything in the table above is a better use of your money than we are.
Floor plan creator
Draw the plan, or bring one you already have.
OpenInterior design apps
What the phone apps charge once you are past the word Free.
OpenAI interior design
Three products share the name. What each one returns.
OpenSketchUp AI credits
Ten credits an image, and the dearer plan costs more per render.
OpenPlanner 5D pricing
Annual against monthly, and where the free tier stops.
OpenRoomSketcher review
Five credits a month, and what saving a project costs.
Open