These incredible budget friendly kids small bedroom ideas will help your space feel GIANT without spending tons of cash!
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How To Make Your Kids Bedroom Feel Small
Kids grow fast, and their rooms need to be updated every few years, especially as they’re growing from little kid to tween to teen! Many people are tempted to blow out their budget for a complete renovation when something small can make a big difference.
It’s not always easy to find ways to make your kids room feel larger without having to do any major renovations. That is why we are here for you! We have found some great kid small bedroom ideas that will help you create a space that feels much larger than it actually is.
Hopefully these are some steps you can take today, which will help you make your small kid’s small bedroom feel large and spacious.
Not only will these ideas save you money in the long run, but they will also add value to your home. Don’t worry if you can’t implement all of these kid small bedroom ideas at one time. Pick a few and give them a try to see if they work for you.
How can I arrange my kids’ small bedroom?
The biggest question you may have when you’re working with a small bedroom is where do you put furniture in a kid’s bedroom? You may need to think outside the box depending on how small the room is and whether or not you have kids sharing a room.
If you’ve got kids sharing a really small bedroom, you may need to get creative with furniture layouts but that can be the fun part!
You could try putting their beds head-to-head in a corner instead of having just the headboard on the wall and the bed taking up floor space. That way the kids’ room is more functional and they have someplace to move around their room and even play in there comfortably.
Another trick to make your kid’s bedroom feel much larger is to put their entire bed up against the wall. You can easily do this by choosing to get them a daybed with underbed storage or just by putting a regular twin along the wall.
If you have a dresser, maybe you can stick it in the closet which will provide more floor space and give you the storage solution you need without it being in the room itself. You also have the added benefit of being able to close the closet doors so that it feels out of sight and out of mind.
How To Visually Make Your Kid’s Small Bedroom Look Bigger
Here are some of our favorite tips on how to visually make the space look larger:
Monochromatic with pops of color accents
Regardless of what color you choose, keeping things in the same color family will help create a seamless look across your entire kid’s room and make it feel larger.
Monochromatic doesn’t have to mean boring. If you want to have an all pink room or an all green room, by all means – you can do it and it will even feel larger than having all different colors.
Your accents can be pops of different color and they can be patterned or solid too. When we refer to accents, we are talking about anything that’s not your main bedroom furniture like the bed, dresser, or nightstands. This could be pillows, lamps, a rug, curtains or even stuffed animals because we all know how little ones need their stuffies.
Solid rug or rug with very simple pattern
Speaking of rugs, you want to make sure that your rug blends in with the rest of your kid’s room in terms of color too. A floor rug is great because it’s usually larger in size than a regular accent piece and it can really help to anchor an area if you put one under your kids’ beds.
You may want to get a simple solid colored rug or one that has just a very subtle pattern on it. If the pattern is too busy, it will make your room feel smaller and draw your eyes to the floor. When you’re already in a smaller space, you don’t want to have your eyes drawn down. You want them up!
Open shelves
We love open shelving because it provides so much extra storage space in a small kids bedroom (or even a living room for that matter) but because there is no back or “structure” to the shelves, it allows for more space to be seen and makes the room feel larger.
Plus, there’s something about having all of your kids’ books or media displayed that’s very aesthetically pleasing for a kids’ room.
Just make sure you choose the right things to display. If your kids have toys all over their room, you don’t want to display them on open shelves because it will just look messy and cluttered. Things like trophies are great for open shelves because they’re not bulky but are still special to your child.
You can also store books on open shelving, just be cautious of what kinds of books you choose. Make your books into decor if you’re choosing to display them on open shelves. You can maybe do board books in the same series on your open shelves or you can arrange your books so the bindings look like a rainbow pattern or are in the cohesive monochrome color scheme you’ve chosen for your child’s bedroom!
Go vertical with storage
Going along with the theme of open shelving, don’t neglect walls as great real estate space for you to use as storage.
There are plenty of options that allow you to have storage on the walls that is creative, yet doesn’t feel messy.
My favorite way to do this is with a pegboard. I love how in this small girl’s nursery, they used a pegboard to display art, but their “art” was functional – like the deer head for the headbands and the storage basket for diapers. You could easily create a DIY version of this idea and it would be a great budget friendly way to help with vertical storage in your kids small bedroom.
Stay neutral with bedding and furniture
When it comes to furniture, having light wood or white can blend in and seem like more of a backdrop than something that sticks out.
I would also suggest having solid or light patterned bedding. It may be tempting to let your little one have the crazy character bedding they want and while there is nothing wrong with it, it may make your room kid’s already small bedroom feel even smaller.
Of course that’s not to say your neutral bedding has to be white or cream. In fact, having bright colored bedding can be a happy medium between the neutrals you may want and the bright character prints they may want.
If you have a patterned comforter, you may want to have solid sheets and solid pillow cases. If your comforter is already very busy, having other patterns on the sheets will only make it worse. Keep your kid’s room cohesive by sticking with one or two main colors throughout.
Be sure to have a few accent pillows that are bright or patterned though because you do want your kids to be able to express themselves with their bedroom decor too. You just don’t want them to go overboard with it! You can wait until they’re teenagers and want to design their own room as an opinionated teen for that.
Try wall decals instead of wallpaper or paint
If you don’t want to go all out and have a black bedroom to have a Star Wars lair or a bright pink princess bedroom, try your hand at wall decals.
Sometimes in a small space, if you’re not careful about the color you choose, it can make your room feel smaller, especially depending on your natural light situation in the room.
With wall decals, sometimes this can feel less permanent and more playful. If you have light and bright walls, you can let your kiddo choose some (not tacky) wall decals that they love and feel like a big kid without making their small bedroom feel even smaller by having a dark or busy color on the walls.
In our house, we only have 8′ ceilings so we also have that going against us when it comes to our rooms feeling even smaller. If your kid’s room doesn’t have high ceilings either, wall decals can also be a great choice for kids room decor for that reason. You don’t want anything that will feel too heavy or dark.
Wall decals have come a long way in the most recent trends. It used to be that wall decals meant polka dots and cartoon characters and that was pretty much it. Now you can find an enormous amount of options for wall decals, from simple shapes to more detailed or abstract designs.
You could even have a plain white wall and create your own decal with paint and some painter’s tape! This could be a great option if you’re artsy and want to bring some of that into your child’s room.
Consider a bed canopy
I know it almost seems counterintuitive to add something to your child’s bed that would essentially “take up space,” but hear me out.
When you have something like a bed canopy that hangs from the ceiling, it creates the illusion of your ceilings being tall and thus, making the room feel bigger.
Pro tip:
You can also do the same with curtains. Hanging curtains high will give the illusion that your child’s bedroom is bigger than it is. Or any room for that matter. We use that trick all in our house and hang the curtains as close to the ceiling as we can get.
In regard to the type of bed canopy that would work best in a kid’s small bedroom, we suggest that it’s either sheer or really lightweight fabric. Having a heavier, darker fabric will make it seem like more of an item of clutter than make the room feel larger.
Kids love canopies because it makes them feel like they’re sleeping in a tent or that they can use it as a secret hideaway. It lets their personality shine through without taking up a ton of space so it’s a win win for everybody!
Additional Small Kids Room Ideas We Swear By
Dual use furniture
When we talked about having a minimal nursery design, we talked about the concept of dual use furniture, but it definitely applies here when you have a kids small bedroom.
You don’t just want a bed that’s a bed. You need a bed that has either storage built into it or that you can get flat storage boxes underneath.
Nightstands are another one. You don’t want to have nightstands that will just take up more room in their bedroom. Having something that’s dual use, like being able to store books underneath or something with a pull out tray on top, can be an effective strategy for adding nice furniture into the small space without taking up a ton of room.
If you don’t even have room for nightstands (like we didn’t in a previous house), maybe do vertical wall shelves attached to the wall instead. That wan you’re not taking up valuable space on the floor, but you still have the storage beside the bed that you may need.
Wall desk
If you’re handy, this would be a great (and inexpensive) DIY project to make your own DIY folding desk. Just searching Google a little while, I was able to find this tutorial for a great DIY folding desk that you can mount on the wall.
If you’re not able to build one or just simply don’t have the time, you can always buy a desk that’s able to be mounted on a wall.
Bunk beds or a loft bed
This almost goes without saying, but even with low ceilings bunk beds are possible. There are tons of different layouts that you can get with bunk beds too depending on your room size, layout, or how many kids are in the room.
I found these bunk beds with the 2 bends beneath it that would house up to 3 kiddos in one room and they look amazing. I love that there’s some visual interest to it so it’s not just triple stacked, although triple stacked are awesome as well.
These from Walmart are an incredible option if you do need them triple stacked. Sleek and modern, the black iron lets you house 3 kids in a small space and the beds don’t feel too clunky.
If you only have one kid in a small space, a loft bed will do the trick. This can allow you to put things under the bed like a desk or lounging area and it will feel part of the bed without taking up more floor space than necessary.
Create visual separation as much as possible
If you have kids sharing a room, do what you can to try to give them their own “space.
This could look like using a see through bookshelf like the KALLAX from Ikea as dual purpose to separate.
This could also mean just having beds that are facing opposite directions so that the kids have a bit of privacy at least when they’re laying down.
You could also use a room divider if you have the space for this.
Reduce clutter as much as possible
Just in general my favorite tip to help with kids small bedroom ideas is to reduce the clutter.
Clutter will always make a space look smaller. Having a few baskets to take care of their toys, books, art supplies, etc. will ensure the kids only have what they need out at one time so you don’t feel overwhelmed when walking into their room.
If clutter is an inevitability in your house (it always seems like it’s inevitable in kids’ rooms, right?), maybe have a spot where all the stuff they need for bedtime is so it’s easier to get ready.
You’d be surprised what a little clutter can do to make your kids room feel like it takes up more space than it really does.
Try to keep their bedroom looking tidy and you’ll be able to make a kids small bedroom feel much bigger.
Conclusion
Whether you’re looking for ways to keep the clutter down, create visual separation between the shared bedroom spaces, or just trying to reduce how cluttered their bedroom feels- it’s all about making them feel like they have more than enough space.
Creating a home that you can enjoy with your family is always worth the effort and the best part is you don’t have to be an interior designer to make it happen!
When it comes to your kids bedrooms or any spaces in your own home for that matter, remember that there are no rules. You need to do what works best for you and your family!
If the past year and a half has taught us anything it’s that you don’t need to do something just because you saw it or read about it on the internet. Meet the needs of the people in your house and let the rest go!
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