16 × 20 ft living room layout
A 16 × 20 ft living room is 320 sq ft (29.73 m²), with 72' (21.95 m) of wall around it. Everything below is worked out from those dimensions rather than written for a room in general — the plan is to scale, and the furniture is measured against the real walls.
16 × 20 ft living room in numbers
- Floor area
- 320 sq ft
- 29.73 m²
- Perimeter
- 72'
- 21.95 m
- Longest wall
- 20'
- 6.10 m
- Wall area at 2.4 m
- 49.3 m²
- door and window deducted
Planning a living room
A living room is planned around sightlines rather than around a single object. Every seat should see the television or the fireplace without turning its neck, everyone should be close enough to talk without raising their voice, and nobody should have to walk between a seat and the screen to get anywhere. That is a harder problem than it sounds, because sofas are much bigger than people remember: a three-seater is over two metres long, and a corner sofa is a 2.6 m square that will not fit through most doorways in one piece. Measure the route in as well as the space it lands in. The numbers below are the ones that decide whether a room feels like a place to sit or a corridor with chairs in it.
A very large or open-plan living room
At this size the walls stop doing the work of defining the room and the furniture has to do it instead. A single seating group floating in the middle of the floor with everything else pushed to the perimeter is the most common mistake — it leaves an unusable moat around the edge and a room that echoes. Instead, build two or three distinct zones with real boundaries: the backs of sofas, a console table, a rug that the front legs of every seat stand on, a change in lighting. A rug is the cheapest of these and the most effective; size it so it reaches under the front legs of all the seating, which for a full group means 2.4 × 3 m or larger, not the 1.6 × 2.3 m that looks big in a shop. If the room is genuinely open-plan and includes dining or kitchen space, leave a 1 m circulation spine running through the whole thing that no zone borrows from, and place the seating so nobody sits with their back to the entrance.
What fits in a 16x20 ft living room
Each piece is measured into a furnished room, not an empty one: it needs its own width plus enough clearance to get past it along the wall, its depth plus that clearance out into the room, and it is checked with a 400 mm television unit on the opposite wall already in place. Both pairs of walls are tried, so a long wall counts either way round. Tight means the piece is physically in the room but the clearance is not — you are edging round it.
| Item | Wall it needs | Depth it needs | In a 16x20 ft living room |
|---|---|---|---|
| Two-seat sofa (1600 × 900) | 2.05 m | 1.75 mincl. 450 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits4.35 m spare |
| Three-seat sofa (2100 × 950) | 2.55 m | 1.80 mincl. 450 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits4.30 m spare |
| Corner sofa (2600 × 2000) | 3.05 m | 2.85 mincl. 450 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits3.25 m spare |
| Armchair (900 × 900) | 1.30 m | 1.70 mincl. 400 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits4.40 m spare |
| Coffee table (1100 × 600) | 1.55 m | 1.45 mincl. 450 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits4.65 m spare |
| TV unit (1500 × 400) | 1.80 m | 1.10 mincl. 300 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits5.00 m spare |
| Bookcase (900 × 300) | 1.65 m | 1.45 mincl. 750 mm clearance and 400 mm opposite | Fits4.65 m spare |
Clearances that decide the layout
- Between the sofa and the coffee table450 mm
- Close enough to reach a mug, far enough to get your legs past. Below 350 mm you climb over it.
- Main walkway through the room900 mm
- One person carrying something. The route between two doors should never drop below this.
- In front of a bookcase or cabinet750 mm
- Standing space with a door or drawer open.
- Screen to the front of the seating2000 mm
- About right for a 55 in television. Closer and you see pixels; much further and subtitles get hard.
Materials for a 16x20 ft living room
Quantities from the real floor and wall areas, with the waste allowance already added. Estimates to plan with — measure again before you order.
| Flooring | With waste | Boxes |
|---|---|---|
| Laminate2.22 m² a box, 10% waste | 32.7 m² | 15 |
| Engineered wood1.8 m² a box, 10% waste | 32.7 m² | 19 |
| Vinyl tile (LVT)3.34 m² a box, 10% waste | 32.7 m² | 10 |
| Ceramic tile1.44 m² a box, 15% waste | 34.2 m² | 24 |
- Paint — about 9 litres for two coats on 49.3 m² of wall, at a 2.4 m ceiling with a door and a window deducted.
- Skirting — 21.12 m once one doorway is taken out of the perimeter.
- Ceiling — the same 29.73 m² as the floor, so roughly 5 litres for two coats.
Change the numbers in the flooring calculator or the paint calculator, both already filled in with this room’s dimensions.
Common questions
- How big is a 16x20 ft living room?
- 320 sq ft (29.73 m²), with a perimeter of 72' (21.95 m). The walls are 16' (4.88 m) and 20' (6.10 m).
- How much flooring does a 16x20 ft living room need?
- 32.7 m² including a 10% waste allowance, which is 15 boxes of laminate at 2.22 m² a box. Tile and engineered wood come in different box sizes, so check the pack before ordering.
- How much paint does a 16x20 ft living room need?
- About 9 litres for two coats on the walls, based on a 2.4 m ceiling, 49.3 m² of wall after a door and a window are deducted, and 12 m² of coverage per litre.
- Will a corner sofa fit in a 16x20 ft living room?
- Yes. It needs 3.05 m of wall and 2.85 m out into the room once its clearance is counted, and this room gives you 3.25 m to spare on top of that.
- How far should a sofa be from the television?
- Roughly 1.5 to 2.5 times the screen's diagonal. For a 55 in (1400 mm) television that is about 2 to 3.5 m. If the room forces you closer than 2 m, buy a smaller screen rather than accepting the compromise — it is the cheaper of the two fixes.
- Should furniture be pushed against the walls?
- Not in a room large enough to avoid it. Pulling the seating 100 to 200 mm off the wall makes a room read as arranged rather than cleared, and in a large room floating the group well off the wall is what stops the middle of the floor becoming dead space. In a small room, against the wall is the right answer.
- Will a corner sofa fit in this room?
- It needs about 2.6 m along one wall and 2 m along the other, plus a walkway. The table above works this out against the actual dimensions of this room. Check the delivery route as well as the room — hallway width, stair turns and door openings stop more corner sofas than floor area does.
- How big should the rug be?
- Big enough that the front legs of every seat stand on it. For a sofa and two chairs that is usually 2 × 3 m; anything smaller floats in the middle of the floor and makes the room look larger than the furniture, in the bad way.
Other living room sizes
- 14x16 ft living room
- 12x14 ft living room
- 12x12 ft living room
- 10x12 ft living room
- 10x10 ft living room
The same size as another room
Before you draw it: how to measure a room and how to draw a floor plan to scale. Real rooms are never exactly 16 × 20 ft — draw yours from scratch if the walls do not match.