How to Draw a Floor Plan Online (Step-by-Step)

Drawing a floor plan used to mean buying expensive CAD software or learning complicated desktop tools. Today you can create an accurate, export-ready floor plan entirely in your browser — for free — in under an hour. This guide walks you through the complete process using TinyGrid.

What You'll Need Before You Start

Before opening the app, gather a few things:

• A tape measure — measure every wall, doorway, and window opening in the space you're drawing.
• A notepad or phone — jot down dimensions as you go room by room.
• A desktop or laptop — TinyGrid works best with a mouse or trackpad for precise placement.

Start at one corner of the room and work clockwise. For each wall, measure:

• The total wall length
• The position and width of every doorway
• The position and width of every window
• Any alcoves, columns, or offsets

For a multi-room floor plan, also note where interior walls meet exterior walls, and whether doors swing inward or outward.

Open TinyGrid in your browser. No account or download is required — you can start drawing immediately.

The app works on a precision grid. By default, each grid square represents one foot. You can adjust the scale in the settings panel if you're working in metric or need a different zoom level.

Create a new project

Click New Project in the toolbar. Give it a name that matches the space — "Master Bedroom" or "Full Ground Floor" — so you can find it easily later.

Select the Wall tool from the left toolbar. Click once to place your starting corner, then click again to draw each wall segment. The app snaps to the grid automatically, so walls align precisely without manual adjustment.

Work around the perimeter of the space in one continuous path, returning to your starting point to close the shape. TinyGrid will highlight when the wall loop is closed correctly.

Once the outer shell is complete, add interior partition walls the same way. Start from an existing wall and draw inward. Interior walls snap to the same grid, so rooms line up without gaps or overlaps.

As you add walls, TinyGrid automatically calculates and displays room dimensions. This makes it easy to verify your drawing matches your measurements.

Open the Fixtures panel and select Door. Click on a wall segment where the door should go — the app places it and shows the swing arc automatically. You can adjust:

• Which way the door swings (left or right hinge)
• Whether it's a single or double door
• The opening width

For windows, select Window from the fixtures panel. Click the wall to place it. The default window symbol shows the standard architectural representation used in professional drawings.

For a room layout plan rather than just a structural plan, you can add furniture and fixtures from the library:

• Kitchen: sink, refrigerator, range, island, cabinets
• Bathroom: toilet, sink, tub, shower
• Bedroom: beds in standard sizes (twin, queen, king)
• Living areas: sofa, dining table, chairs

Drag items from the library onto your floor plan. Use the selection tool to resize or rotate any fixture. This is useful for testing whether furniture will fit before you move it in real life.

Select the Text tool and click inside each room to add a label — "Kitchen," "Living Room," "Bedroom 1," etc. You can also add the room area if you want the label to include square footage.

TinyGrid adds dimension lines automatically as you draw, but you can also place custom dimension annotations using the Dimension tool to call out specific measurements on the exported plan.

When the plan looks right, click Export in the top toolbar. Choose PDF for the most universally useful format — it preserves exact proportions and looks professional whether printed or shared digitally.

Free users get a standard PDF export. Pro users can export at higher resolution and in DXF format for use in CAD software like AutoCAD or DraftSight.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Skipping the measuring step. Estimating room sizes from memory almost always results in a floor plan that's off by enough to matter. Measure first, always.
• Not accounting for wall thickness. Exterior walls in most homes are 5–6 inches thick; interior walls are typically 4.5 inches. TinyGrid wall segments have configurable thickness — use the right value for accurate room dimensions.
• Forgetting door clearance. A door that swings into a room needs 3–4 feet of clear space to open fully. Mark this on your plan before deciding where to place furniture.
• Drawing at the wrong scale. Double-check that the app's grid scale matches your measurement units. If you're measuring in feet, make sure the grid is set to feet — not meters.

What to Do With Your Floor Plan

Once you have a clean, accurate floor plan, you can use it for:

• Contractor bids — share the PDF with contractors when getting estimates. It removes ambiguity and speeds up the quoting process.
• Permit applications — many local building departments accept browser-exported PDFs for minor permit applications and renovations.
• Furniture shopping — know exactly what fits before buying.
• Real estate listings — floor plans improve listing engagement significantly.
• Interior design planning — hand off a clean plan to a designer instead of starting from scratch.

Next Steps

Once you're comfortable with the basics, explore TinyGrid's more advanced features:

• Multiple layers for electrical, plumbing, or furniture overlays
• Dimension lines with gaps for a professional architectural look
• Cloud sync to access your plans from any device (Pro and Cloud plans)

The free plan covers everything in this guide. If you find yourself working on multiple projects or needing DXF export, the one-time Pro upgrade is worth considering.