Home Designer Interiors 2019 Review

This comprehensive home design software can help you revise your home's floor plan by inserting new walls and changing fixtures, floor materials, colors and textures, among other things. You can then view the results in 3D before you make any drastic changes to your actual home.

Top Ten Reviews Verdict

Home Designer Interiors is a useful interior design application that can help you renovate almost any living space. Also, it’s your best bet if you have a Mac computer.

Pros

  • +

    The object library has thousands of items, including furniture, cabinets, plants and more.

Cons

  • -

    There is a steep learning curve to mastering the program.

Why you can trust Top Ten Reviews Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.

This comprehensive home design software can help you revise your home's floor plan by inserting new walls and changing fixtures, floor materials, colors and textures, among other things. You can then view the results in 3D before you make any drastic changes to your actual home. Also, of all the Mac-compatible interior design software we reviewed, this one is by far the best. However, Home Designer Interiors has a steep learning curve, and you need to dedicate many hours to learn to use it properly.

There are thousands of items in Home Design Interior’s object library, and the materials library boasts tens of thousands of items. You can choose from a variety of appliances, bathroom fixtures, cabinets, doors and fireplaces. Further, this software includes a host of flooring options, light fixtures, railings, windows, furniture and even houseplants. It also has materials and objects to create a handicap-accessible home.

However, the program doesn’t include outdoor furniture for patios, porches and lawns. Since many people regard these spaces as outdoor rooms and very much a part of the house, that may be a drawback. Still, this software has the second largest object library of the programs we reviewed – the biggest is found in Virtual Architect Ultimate.

Home Designer Interior’s drag-and-drop feature works only in 2D mode, but you can update items and alter colors and materials in the 3D view. The software has you choose an object in the library on the right side of the screen, and you then click the spot in the design you want it to go.

If you want to remodel rather than rebuild, you can scan your home’s blueprints and import them into the program. You can then create new rooms or additions by removing or adding walls, windows and doors. In addition, you can redesign windows and doors and choose new moldings and window coverings. The trace tool allows you to build rooms over images. Afterward, you delete the image and what remains is a 2D rendition of the room you can decorate and see in 3D mode.

This application has automatic floor plan dimensioning and customizable room templates. It can also plan for the more practical parts of a design, including electrical, heating, plumbing and air conditioning components. In addition, you can insert staircases with just a few clicks of the mouse and create curved walls to enhance the rooms you design.

As you decorate a room, Home Designer Interior’s pre-arranged furniture groupings help you better plan the space. You can choose from a variety of furniture styles and add accessories to rooms.

If you like the color and texture on an existing piece of furniture or another surface, you can use the eyedropper tool to sample it and apply it to any other item you want. In addition, you can borrow colors and textures from websites and even blend two borrowed colors until you have exactly the shade you want before you apply it to surfaces in your virtual home.

Home Designer Interiors shows your final designs in accurate, attractive 2D and 3D digital mock-ups. You can even virtually tour your plan with the 3D walkthrough feature and get still images from different angles in your virtual rooms. Further, you can export a VR file and take a virtual reality tour of your home with Google Cardboard and other VR devices.

The program’s interior and exterior lighting recreations make the plans even more realistic because they show you where shadows fall. You can even adjust settings so the mirrors have accurate reflections and light appears the way it does in your actual home.

The program makes it easy to budget for your projects with its built-in materials list and cost estimator. You can perform calculations for cabinets, windows, countertops, hardwood and carpet with the materials available to you in the objects library. Using that list of the materials you need and the realistic estimate of their costs, you'll have a good idea if your project fits in your budget before you start building.

Home Designer Interiors has impressive customer support options in case you run into difficulties. There is a generous assortment tutorial videos and numerous how-to articles as well as community forums with product training, tips and input from other users to help you get the most from this software. In addition, you can get direct customer support via live chat and phone.

If you use a Macintosh, you know that good programs aren’t always available for that platform. This is not the case with Home Designer Interiors – the Mac version is identical to the Windows version, and it’s the best interior design software for Apple computers.

J.D. Chadwick
Contributor

J.D. Chadwick started writing articles for Top Ten Reviews 2008 and, after filling the role of Multimedia Editor, the keen video creator and expert in software was one of the most prolific members of the TTR team, authoring articles on things like antivirus software, video editing apps, and more.